


Protège-Moi

by ThoseSadisticTendencies



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies), Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Abduction, Activist Newt, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternative Universe - No Magic, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Animal Abuse, BDSM, Blow Jobs, Breathplay, Cannibalism, Courtship, Dubious Consent, Dubious Morality, Duct Tape, Exhibitionism, F/M, Face-Fucking, Financial Issues, Fluff and Angst, Ice Play, M/M, Manipulative Relationship, Murder, Murder Husbands, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Non-Consensual Somnophilia, Oral Fixation, Psychiatrist Grindelwald, Rimming, Rough Oral Sex, Semi-Public Sex, Sex Toys, Slow Burn, Student Newt Scamander, Sugar Daddy, Sugar Daddy Grindelwald(ish), Teacher-Student Relationship, Teasing, Unhealthy Relationships, Violence, mental fuckery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:35:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 15
Words: 127,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27433657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThoseSadisticTendencies/pseuds/ThoseSadisticTendencies
Summary: Postgrad student Newt Scamander runs into a string of devastating bad luck that leaves him financially destitute and in dire straits. He follows advice from Queenie and seeks help from some rather questionable sources.Unfortunately, he soon finds himself running for his life and finds aid in the form of renowned psychiatrist and wealthy socialite Gellert Grindelwald.A relationship quickly blooms between the two and Newt finds himself caught between the pains of past love, the dangers of his new one and the warnings of many important people in his life about the killer stalking the streets - murdering young men and devouring all that they have to offer...Can Newt make sanity out of any of it and will he survive the darker desires and insatiable appetite of the man he is being so thoroughly ensnared by?
Relationships: Gellert Grindelwald/Newt Scamander, Original Percival Graves/Newt Scamander, Past Newt Scamander/Albus Dumbledore, Queenie Goldstein/Jacob Kowalski, Tina Goldstein/Theseus Scamander, past Albus Dumbledore/Gellert Grindelwald - Relationship
Comments: 47
Kudos: 88





	1. A Second Wind Coming

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Vindsie (Vins)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vins/gifts), [The_Pied_Piper](https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Pied_Piper/gifts).



> Filling prompt by The_Pied_Piper (ish) who wanted a Hannibal crossover and though I doubt this is what they had in mind, it's whatever my deranged and bored mind spat up. Beta'd as ever by the lovely Vindsie. :)  
> ...Enjoy?

_12 th October _

Newt stared at the crack in his wall with an ardent fascination that he would only usually reserve for the most interesting and unique of creatures. The crack, however, posed no such intrigue; it just happened to be the one grain of rice that tipped the scale of Newt’s already unsteady life into the realms of destitution. It had honestly been fine up until he had agreed to loan Jacob – his sister-in-law’s boyfriend and a dear friend of his own - a substantial amount of money to start his bakery. Newt had felt confident in both his ability to live on without the money and in his friend’s likelihood of being able to repay it. Anyone who had tried Jacob’s cooking would be suckered into visiting any shop he opened on an unhealthily regular basis but unfortunately, Newt had not counted on the triple-barrelled disaster that had promptly been hurled his way soon after.

Firstly, there had been the business of a sudden rent increase as his landlord claimed that the animals Newt was keeping were causing structural damage – utterly preposterous, as there were only three cats, two reptiles, six birds of various creeds and a dozen or so smaller mammals that refused to be categorised by ‘normal’ pet protocols. Despite the student’s arguments, Mr Worme upped Newt’s rent to a figure that would have been strenuous even had the next two disasters not occurred in swift succession.

The next misfortune came in the form of Newt’s backpack and the contents of his wallet being stolen when he had fallen asleep on the bus home one night after work. He had been forced to quickly freeze his bank account as his card had been in the stolen wallet, though thankfully, his phone had been stashed in his pocket. He had been returning to his flat on the outskirts of Dublin via the long, convoluted bus route that honestly drove at much slower speeds than any motorised vehicle had any right to go and had inadvertently let the exhaustion of the previous week of study, work and activism creep up on him. He had been awoken by the bus driver two stops after his own as the man vacated the bus and had been shocked and dismayed to find his bag and its contents gone, left only with the scruffy blue coat and striped yellow and black scarf that had been wrapped tightly around his slender frame. It had been around then that Newt had felt the beginnings of anxiety of a higher calibre begin to constrict his insides, but that sensation took proper hold of him only when the last weight had tipped the scales solidly in his disfavour.

One of the animals he had opened his home to had fallen under the weather and showed little signs of improvement despite his avid care – a red fox he had christened Lila. The fox suffering from an injured paw that had been treated by him numerous times over the three months since he had rescued her from the area of train tracks where he had found her, injured and alone. He had sought ‘entirely hypothetical’ advice from vets and the wildlife trust but all had insisted that keeping a fox in a residential area was not a suitable idea. Newt had, of course, understood their concerns and attempted to release Lila back into the wild areas on the outskirts of the city but not only had she refused to leave his side but her injury had proven too severe for her to return to her natural habitat. Newt had been obliged to take her back with him, the shivering, injured cub curled protectively in his old blue coat all the way back to his modest flat. Her injury had proved a continuing malady that required regular treatment and much rest and Newt hadn’t the heart to try to leave her even when she started showing signs of improvement. Now, however, not only was her paw causing her problems once more but she had developed Toxoplasmosis and Newt would not have usually been too concerned had his patient not been already weakened by her injury. She needed medicine and care that Newt wasn’t sure he could afford; something that set a leaden weight in his gut like nothing else. 

Newt had spent as much time as he could caring for her but was already stretched thin between his master’s degree – continuing his studies in Exotic Animal Training and Management, earning a wage at the university book and coffee-shop and then his less-than-legal activities outside of his education. Over the past eight years, Newt had become a prominent member of a number of animal rights groups that had begun in his first year of Sixth-Form and continued as he made the move from London to Dublin for his further education. Not to mention the intervening years between his undergraduate and postgraduate travelling the world to continue his conservation and activist work. He had begun to spend his nights, weekends and any spare time he managed to find working to better the lives of any creatures he could find that were living in subpar or abusive circumstances and saving any that he could. He and a few online and university acquaintances had managed to close down two cosmetics companies based in the city that had been testing illegally on animals through the admittedly risky strategies of breaking, entering and the leaking of confidential documents and records. Newt may have been in hot water with the law on more than a few occasions but he considered it more than worth it for the lives that were saved. 

Theseus was of another opinion on the matter, of course, but that was nothing particularly new for the siblings and as the elder Scamander was occupied fully back in London with his wife and nine-year-old son as well as a shining career as the detective in the Metropolitan police service, it rarely came up these days. Tina didn’t mind Newt’s ‘vigilantism’, as she often put it, but it had still been some time since Newt had made the journey back to London – everyone involved’s busy schedules justifying the separation in a way that truth and awkward circumstances could never suitably do. Newt hadn’t seen his nephew since the boy’s sixth birthday but was able to keep up with him via the sparing video calls that Tina managed to catch him on whenever Queenie was on the same shift as Newt at work. The chirpy blonde manned the barista work whilst Newt handled the customers buying books but the shop was most often used by students because of the caffeine supply and free Wi-Fi rather than for the admittedly meagre book selection. This usually resulted in Newt stacking shelves, handling deliveries and cleaning up after the customers and whilst it was dull work that required a little too much socialising for his taste, it paid the minimum wage that allowed Newt to continue living quite comfortably in his modest flat.

Or at least it had done. Now, however, as the young man glared at the crack that had appeared above his bathroom door and spread down to split the frame, he couldn’t help but wonder just how much more bad luck could be piled upon one person before it got better. Queenie would no doubt tell him to ‘buck up’ had she been there and would assure him that everything would get better if he only had the patience to wait, sadly, time was something he was finding himself sorely short of right now. The rent had been due a week and a half ago and Newt had been living off of the cash he had stashed around his flat, the edible supplies he could scrounge from his stores of animal feed and the leftover pastries, drinks and overdone food that he occasionally snagged from work.

He couldn’t ask Jacob for the money back even if he had the heart to do so as the man had already invested it and was working his best to start up the business to start paying Newt back. And once again, whilst Newt had faith in his friend's endeavours, he hadn’t the time to wait for it to pay off. Worme was breathing down his neck and threatening to evict him and his ‘menagerie of mangy beasts' and said group of animals were only too happy to remind him of just how hungry and in need of attention they really were. He’d had to cut down food portions and treats so as to stretch out the remaining supplies that bit longer but knew that it was only a temporary solution; he would need to seek help eventually.

Frederick came to scratch at Newt’s bare toes with irritated meows and a scrunching of his large, slightly misshapen, one-eyed face – reminding the student just why such creatures were in his care to begin with. It wasn’t just because they were good company or that Newt found them and their individual needs a stimulating challenge. No, it was because they had been abused and outcast by most and - even in an improving system that strived to right such wrongs through charity cases and appeals rife with ads that featured big sad eyes staring out from posters – Newt couldn’t help but feel the mutual bond between himself and his creatures. They stayed with him by choice, each and every one, and Newt could never and _would_ never turn his back on that.

Desperate times call for desperate measures and all that.

He stood with a deep sigh, digging out the last two cans of tuna and splitting them between himself, Monty, Frederick and Helga, though, predictably, the cats ended up with the lion's share. He was under no illusions that the currently affectionate felines would not attempt to eat him should he die in the flat...or if he just slept in too long. He had once caught Monty nibbling on his bare toe once when he had passed out on the sofa after one particularly long shift and though he had given the oldest cat a stern talking to, the look in his big amber-green eyes as he licked his bowl clean told Newt that he’d just as well take more just than a nibble if Newt didn’t sort out his sorry state of affairs soon. Christ, he was being judged pitiful by hobbled ex-stray cats now, too.

Newt glanced at the clock, seeing that he had barely over an hour to get back to work and hastened to cram on his boots, pull on a woolly green jumper over his button-down shirt and dragged his coat on over the lot. The coat was admittedly too small for him to wear with layers underneath but it was both his favourite and only coat now as he had sold the two others he’d had. It had been a present from his mother who, whilst being a kind woman, was, for the most part, entirely unreachable; she buried herself in her work for months and years on end and the last Newt had heard, she had been guiding an endangered species of cattle through the Himalayas to protect them from the slaughterhouse she had liberated them from. People who knew her often commented that Newt was most certainly a chip off the old block. Newt had always found a secret smile to share with her as she corrected them that Newt was an entirely new block; one that didn’t need parental pressure or role models to know that helping creatures was the right thing to do. But as much as they got along, Helena Scamander would be unable to alleviate Newt’s current financial woes.

Evening shifts were generally quieter and Newt grabbed his leather satchel bag, cramming a few textbooks and his notepad into it in place of the laptop that had been stolen along with his wallet. Newt hurried out of the door, bidding a parting check and goodbye to his menagerie of roommates and scooping up Pickett as it became clear that the needy Sand Lizard would once again refuse to be left behind. He let the small, vibrantly green and brown speckled lizard burrow into the pocket of cultivated sand he kept especially for his oldest and dearest companion, smiling as he felt the familiar weight of the reptile settle against his leg through the coat. Pickett burrowed deep for warmth and began to munch on the flowerheads and slugs he had left for his friend with fervour. Content that Pickett would not be emerging for some time, Newt headed out the door, locking it behind him whilst carefully turfing a clingy Frederick back into the house with one foot.

As much as he hated to leave any of his creatures, he knew that taking them with him was not an option – he had learnt that the hard way with many of them. He knew he could take Pick with him as he had been doing so for over eleven years now and the lizard had proven to be of a pining and affectionate nature; doing much better being close to Newt’s body warmth and often demonstrating his compassion for the Zoologist with licks of his tongue across the young man’s hand or letting out little hisses of contentment whenever fed something particularly good. The journey was far from pleasant but uneventful as, lacking the sufficient funds for the bus and still feeling somewhat suspicious of it after his robbery, Newt found himself speed walking the fifty-minute trip in the drizzling rain and cold. He hugged his coat tight to him the whole way and made sure to keep a hand in his pocket to offer Pickett any extra warmth he could muster, though the layers of wet wool did little to insulate the Zoologist against the frigid October air.

Soaking wet, shivering and sneezing, Newt reached the university grounds and managed to swipe his student card to get into the campus complex without trouble despite Pickett’s insistent migration from his pocket to curl around his arm underneath his damp shirt. Newt huffed a laugh as he hurried past the surprisingly large crowd of waiting customers to stow his sodden belongings in the storeroom behind the tills, calling an absent greeting to Queenie’s cheerful trill and scrubbing his hands clean in preparation to start serving. 

The shift passed quickly for the next few hours, the stream of customers for both the coffee bar and sign-in desk subduing into a general smattering of headphoned students at tables, ignoring the real world and one another in favour of their screens. Newt gratefully perched himself on the stack of cardboard boxes leant against the wall behind the till, pulling out his textbook and notes, clamping his pen absently between his teeth as he pored over the biological basis of animal behaviour – a fairly basic module but still one that Newt found intriguing, nonetheless. He had just finished the section on physiological mechanisms and evolutionary function when he was drawn from his contemplation by Queenie’s bright, accented voice.

“Whatcha reading there, oh fantastic lizard boy?”

Newt offered her a weak smile around the pen and mumbled, “No matter how many times you call me that, Queenie, I still think that it’s highly unlikely I’m going to turn into some reptilian superhero.”

She snorted a laugh, her blonde curls bouncing as she adjusted her hot pink, form-fitting shirt beneath her black apron, “You can’t kill my dreams like that! Who knows, maybe one day Pick’ll bite you and you’ll turn into the next Peter Parker!”

Newt cocked an eyebrow at her over the textbook, removing the pen from between his teeth as he gestured with it toward the creature in question who was currently curled safely back into Newt’s dripping coat on the wall. “I told you before, even if I did somehow magically transform into anything, I don’t see how acquiring a taste for spiders and slugs, liking warm sand and having an extraordinarily long tongue would help me be any sort of hero.”

Queenie shook her head with another bright grin, “Well, you might get better luck finding a date if you did have the tongue thing.”

“Queenie…” Newt sighed, flushing pink and shaking his head in turn, his amusement laced heavily with embarrassment. 

“Come oooon, Newt, it’s been _years_!” she half-moaned and Newt flushed darker as he saw a couple sitting two tables away smirking, though they had the decency to look away. The Zoologist gave his colleague a pointed look; Queenie pouted but complied and lowered her voice as she continued, “You know it’s been a while and you’re real busy and everything but it’s never too late to get out there. You could find yourself just as happy as me and Jacob.” She reached forward and ruffled his damp, messy hair into more copper chaos than it already was and he scowled half-heartedly at her, swatting her painted nails away too. 

“I’m afraid you’ve been watching too many romcoms, Queenie. You don’t have to play the supportive, weirdly horny friend every time we’re on shift together – I’m not broken so please don’t try to fix me. I don’t need to rush into something, I’m perfectly happy just the way I am,” he continued to scribble notes as he spoke, cocking an eyebrow at her over his book as she sighed.

“But you seemed real happy when you were with what’s-his-name, uh, the teacher!” Newt hissed at her like he might to scold one of his cats, narrowing his eyes meaningfully as he glanced about all at the other people in the room.

“Even _if_ I was willing to try something like that again, I’m poor as poor at the moment and you know it. I can’t afford to go out with anyone. Not really.”

Whilst it was true, they both knew the excuse for what it was and Newt felt a familiar ache in his chest at the thought of the loss he had suffered back when he had begun his studies in London, spending only five months there before his transfer to Dublin. Newt had craved the distance from his old life as much as he had acquiesced to Queenie's plea that he join her and Jacob in the very city he had introduced her to. The couple had been so wholly supportive in the black period after Newt’s breakup and subsequent move that it had forged a much stronger bond between the three than Newt had previously thought possible. Sure, Queenie was his family by marriage but both she and Jacob had grown to be family by choice as much as law.

Queenie’s green eyes roved over him with familiar concern, taking in his thin frame and somewhat haggard appearance with her bottom lip caught between her teeth, gnawing on it in agitation as she nodded, seemingly in contemplation. “I’ve been thinking about that for a while now…I might have a solution to your money problems.”

“Oh?” Newt’s brows rose to new heights and suspicion needled at him; he trusted Queenie but he hadn’t ever heard of many ways of solving money woes that were particularly safe or desirable, especially not ones that warranted this amount of trepidation from the usually painfully impulsive and optimistic Queenie. 

“Yeah, I...I might happen to know someone who could help- he’s not like a loan shark or anything, real weird but a reliable guy.”

“What do you mean by weird, exactly?” Newt hedged, eying his friend with a healthy amount of scepticism and she continued to gnaw on her lip in a less than encouraging manner, looking conflicted.

“He has some requirements before he gives anyone money – likes to meet them first and see what sort of folk he’s helping.”

“I’m sensing there’s a catch?” Newt pressed, sensing a rather big ‘but' coming. He was decidedly unsurprised when Queenie tried to cover her apprehension with a nervous chuckle.

“He likes to know people’s blood type before he meets them – the guy is really into all the superstitious stuff, star signs, the occult and all that sort of thing and he says that knowing someone comes from knowing their blood.”

“And you want me to go to this utter lunatic for help because...?”

She threw her head and gave him a sullen look, “Because you need help, honey, and I hate seeing you struggle like this when I know a way to get you the money without any loan fees or interest that some big bank is gonna suck you dry of later.”

“Queenie, no one gives out large sums of money for nothing and I’ve got to admit that I’m rather surprised you even know people like this. How did you hear about this? Why didn’t you and Jacob go to him for the bakery loan if he’s so fantastic?”

“He’s a business colleague of Vinda's. You remember Vinda, the girl from my business class? You guys met at my Christmas party last year?” Queenie barrelled on even Newt could assent or put a word in edgeways that he hadn’t really liked or spoken to the pretty though haughty French woman he remembered Queenie introducing him to as she bustled about in a swirl of pink tinsel sparkle. “She’s...involved with this guy who knows everybody and is good at helping people out when they need it. He knows the guy who offered to fund my scholarship so I could study business to help out Jakey with the bakery.”

"Ah of course, your anonymous sponsor," Newt said wryly "Can't say these references are filling me with an excess of confidence."

She pouted “I just know how judgy you can be about some things but that’s not what’s important here. What’s important is that you need money and I know someone who can give it to you,” she looked at him oddly then, her head tilted as she prodded, “What will happen to your critters if you get kicked out of your apartment to starve to death on the streets?”

“I...I’ll think of something, I can just wait until Jacob pays me back, I can-" he trailed off at the pitying look that Queenie was giving him and at the sheer fact that even Newt didn’t believe the words he was saying. He caught a glimpse of himself then; of how he must look in his friend’s eyes; skinny, destitute and desperate enough that he was fine with walking, ill and exhausted, through wind, rain and sleet in threadbare clothes for four bloody miles to get to a low-paying job because he needed it to support the lives he had taken under his wing. Jacob’s included, now that he came to think of it; that bakery wasn’t just a passion for him, it was a livelihood and an investment for a better life for the man and his doting girlfriend. Newt couldn’t find it in himself to regret loaning his friend the money but he also knew in that moment that he needed help just as much as his friend had and that another friend was now offering him a chance he sorely needed.

Could he really turn that down?

Jacob had put his faith in Newt when he had asked for the loan and Newt had done the same by giving it. Shouldn’t he place that same level of trust in Queenie when she was offering him a way out?

Newt swallowed, his throat dry and tickling in a way past the coughs that threatened to wrack his aching chest as he looked to Queenie. “So, who exactly is this friend of yours?”

Her smile was just a bit on the wrong side of relieved to be reassuring but by this point, Newt couldn’t find it in himself to care much past the thoughts of all the fragile lives depending on him back in his tenuously held flat. Most of those animals would not survive being turned over to other owners or even most charities or wildlife responsibility groups and Newt didn’t much fancy the thought of having to abandon everything he had worked for in his life so far – his home, education, friends and prospects – and be forced to turn to his brother for help. Tina and Theseus would not be able to support him even if he asked, they were struggling to afford living in central London with a nine-year-old son as it was and Newt wasn’t about to add to that by sofa-surfing because he had refused help when it was offered. 

“I’m sure I could set up a meeting if you’d like? Soon, huh?”

Newt nodded mutely, eying his own battered brown boots and picking at a hole in his old green jumper with jittery fingers. She reached over and quickly squeezed his hand before bustling off to deal with the errant customer that had wandered up to the coffee bar in her absence and Newt turned distractedly back to his notes, concentration lost in the realisation that he was in the deep end now; not just going through a rough patch but truly struggling. He had always been so good with his finances up until now. He wouldn’t have made the loan to Jacob had he thought it would put him in a situation like this, he was a bit too soft-hearted, sure – something that Theseus often liked to reprimand him about at great length – but he also wasn’t careless. Newt had gotten through his undergraduate and early adult years quite comfortably and it seemed that it was only this recent string of catastrophic bad luck that had derailed him. Could it really take such an unfortunate cluster combination of circumstances to put him in dire need? Yes, it seemed, it most certainly could. 

He thought of the crack in his wall, the shut-off heating, the bare cupboards and his own dwindling state and steeled himself for the potentially risky decision he was making. Surely Queenie wouldn’t lead him too far astray? They’d known one another for over five years and had worked together for the previous two, she was his sister-in-law and whilst being a bit of a gossipmonger and busybody, she had never displayed an ounce of malice toward him or anyone he knew. With the exception of one particularly rude customer two weeks before, but even Newt had been on the verge of thumping the pervert in the face after he grabbed Queenie by the waist and suggested that she put her painted pink lips to better use. His colleague had soundly slapped the lout about the face and Newt quickly chivvied her behind both him and the bar and called campus security to have the man escorted off the premises. The incident had shaken both of them, and Queenie had behaved oddly affectionate - even by her standards – ever since. Jacob had called him soon after and thanked him profusely for how he had handled the situation and Newt had mumbled his way through an explanation of what had actually happened without Queenie’s usual dramatic flair but Jacob had still insisted that he owed Newt a lifetime of free pastries the moment he got the bakery up and running.

Just the thought of biting into one of Jacob’s legendary Pączkis, the orange zest and syrup exploding over his tongue in a sweet cacophony…it had his empty stomach rumbling audibly and the Zoologist found himself eying the abandoned vegan sausage roll on the far table with eager eyes. He was just about sidling towards it when he was stopped short by a flash of greying-auburn hair as an older man entered the shop, scarf and hat tangled in a momentarily confusing jumble around his face and Newt held his breath, contradictorily excited and terrified at the chance it could be-..and then the scarf fell away and Newt let out the pent up breath to see an unfamiliar and clean-shaven face that dashed his misplaced hope. He had no reason to believe that his former partner would visit him here or even that he knew where he was. It was stupid to even think it, really.

He shook the thoughts from his head and made his previously planned beeline for the cold pastry, snagging it under the pretence of clearing the tables and munching it in the backroom as he stuck the plates and cups in the dishwasher. When he emerged, he saw that Queenie was no longer at the coffee bar and was heading toward the door with her thematically pink phone pressed to one ear with a focussed expression on her face, eyes wide and blonde brows furrowed. Newt watched her leave with apprehension but supposed that it was likely a call from Jacob, informing her of the progression of the business plans. He found himself somewhat eager to hear what he had to say as he was both the sole investor and completely financially dependent on the outcome of Jacob and Queenie's business venture.

It was some time before she returned and when she did, her expression was halfway between excited and sombre, and when she squeezed Newt’s shoulder gently as she went past him to the tills, he didn’t feel a lessening of the leaden feeling in his gut. It was even longer, the end of their shift, in fact, when she finally spoke to him of it as whilst Newt had had had few enough of customers to mostly bury himself in his books, she had had a fairly steady stream of people getting refills or coffees to go.

Newt was mopping the floor around the bar area for her when she reached up and tapped his shoulder, a deceptively big grin stretching brightly painted lips as he turned and straightened to face her.

“What?”

“Guess who managed to get you a meeting tonight?”

“Tonight? It’s late already and you know I’m working-"

He cut off as she shook her curly head with a sly smile, “Not anymore you’re not, managed to get you paid leave from Fiennes in the morning by telling him you have spattering sickness.”

“Queenie, you do know that’s a fictional disease that only affects Peruvian Reptiles, don’t you?”

“And he doesn’t, so I can’t see any problems with my story, Newt major.”

Newt rolled his eyes at the nickname; one born of his near-constant reptilian companion who Queenie often referred to as Newt minor. “Well thank you, I suppose, but I’m still not too sure about all of this.”

She reached over and squeezed his hand reassuringly, “It’ll all work out, Newt, sweetie, I promise.”

He gave her a weak smile in return, “I hope you’re right.”

“Usually am,” she replied flippantly and flicked her hair from her face before turning to flick off the main lights and grab her magenta clutch purse. “Ya ready?”

“As ready as I can be, though I feel I should mention that I don’t have an active bank account at the moment, I had to freeze my card when it got stolen.”

“That won’t matter, it’ll all be in cash anyways.”

Newt sighed at length as he held the door open for them both to leave, “And that just fills me with such overwhelming confidence that does.”

“Oh stop being such a sour-puss. Paying in cash isn’t always dodgy – plenty of legitimate businesses and businessmen pay in cash.”

“Right,” Newt mumbled, head bowed in dejected acceptance as he trailed behind Queenie, noting that they were heading toward the nearest tram stop to the university and came up short, stopping in the street-lit pavement “Queenie-...where exactly are we going? Can’t we walk it?”

She evidently sensed the question for what it was and flapped her hand dismissively at him, gripping him by the arm and pulling him forward into the carriage just as the doors were about the close, “It’s fine, I’ll cover you, just come on!”

The trip was short, only about ten or maybe fifteen minutes, Newt couldn’t have said, stuck in a haze of indecision and exhaustion; was it too late to back out, to tell Queenie that he didn’t need her help? That didn’t seem fair after she’d arranged all of this at such short notice for him. No, he would wait and meet the man and if he seemed like bad news then Newt would simply leave. There was no need to get so worked up about it; worrying just meant you suffered twice, after all.


	2. Rattles the bones

_12 th October_

The office Newt was led into after entering a pretty average looking 70s built grey tower block was discouraging to say the least; largely simply by the fact that ‘office’ was a generous term to begin with. It was more a living space that happened to have a desk planted squarely in the centre. The figure sitting at it wasn’t particularly much better; an older man with thinning, dirty-blonde hair, a thick-set face and cold grey eyes that seemed to hold a distaste for everything they fell upon. Including Newt too, it seemed, although they did linger longer on Queenie and soften just a fraction – or more specifically, on certain parts of her. Either his friend did not notice the attention or just chose not to comment upon it as she strode forward confidently, purse clutched tight in one hand as she stuck the other out to shake the man's. He took it but his eyes were fixed upon Newt just past the dip of Queenie’s waist from his sitting position. His drab grey suit crinkled and there was cigarette smoke lingering in the air around him as Newt stepped forward too, awkwardly following Queenie’s lead and feeling a strong though bony grip that threatened to crush his own momentarily before they parted.

“Mr Scamander,” the man’s voice was terse and unfriendly but more business-like than his shabby surroundings might suggest. “Gunnar Grimmson, a pleasure.”

“I'm sure,” Newt blurted sardonically before his brain caught up with his tongue as the man’s expression darkened, “I mean, yes, of course, it’s good to meet you too, Mr Grimmson, ah, sir-” he trailed off at the disbelieving look the man was giving him and instead cleared his throat before asking in a deliberately brisk manner. “So, Queenie tells me that you can- are willing to help me out. With money, that is?”

“Sure, I can help you, Mr Scamander, although I think this might be a discussion better had in private. Your friend can wait outside if she likes, this shouldn’t take long.”

“Right, right, sure, yeah, I’ll be outside when you’re finished, see ya in a bit, sweetie.” Queenie seemed very keen to be out of there and Newt couldn’t help but wonder if she had, in fact, noticed the way Grimmson had been looking at her. Regardless, he couldn’t say he blamed the young woman for wanting to get out of the smoky, dingy office nor for avoiding that searching grey stare; he was feeling a little hot under the collar himself.

He glanced at Grimmson one more time before leaning in close to Queenie and urging her in a whisper, “I think it might be best if you pop off home, actually. I’ll call you later to let you know how it goes.” She looked somewhat indecisive for a few tense moments before she too glanced at Grimmson and then nodded silently, taking her leave on fleet feet. The door closed behind her with a soft snap and Newt heard the click of her heeled pumps down the long corridor outside for a few moments before the ding of the lift sounded and he turned his attention back to the business at hand.

Newt sat when Grimmson gestured for him to do so, perching on the edge of the seat and looking about the sparsely decorated room with apprehension, taking in the blank off-white walls, stacks of boxes, sofa and the kitchenette and sink set off to one side. It looked like the man might be living in his workspace and Newt did not feel encouraged by the implication if he was going to be borrowing money off said man. He almost said as much but thankfully managed to bite his tongue this time around.

“So I’m sure that your bird told you about my policies when it comes to paying out my money to folk like you, right?”

“She’s not my-...as to say, yes, Queenie did tell me a little,” Newt caught himself from berating Grimmson for the less than appropriate comment and instead hedged _very politely indeed_ with his eyes fixed upon the scarred wood between them, “She mentioned that you have an interest in the occult and that you wanted to know me before you were willing to do business.”

Grimmson barked out a laugh, “That’s one way of putting it, yeah, I have a different way of figuring people than most and I’ve found it to be pretty damn effective so far.” He snorted slightly, waving a hand absently about the room as he lit up a cigarette, “Don’t let the place fool you, I’m good for the money and I’m happy with my lot; I’ve got plenty of cash to spare and even more coming in soon. I just don’t fancy doing business with down-on-their-luck strangers in anyplace decent. Like to keep the meeting places quiet and impermanent if you know what I mean?”

“I suppose that makes sense,” Newt agreed quietly, playing with the hole his jumper again before saying, “I don’t suppose you could tell me how much you’d be willing to offer...or why you are apparently not seeking any interest on it?”

Grimmson leant forward, jacketed elbows thumping the table as he steepled his fingers underneath a lightly stubbled chin, “And who says I’m not looking for any interest?”

Newt’s eyes shot up to meet the older man’s hard grey ones in further apprehension and he nearly jolted from the edge of his seat right then and there, “I’m sorry, I should have realised- I really must be going.” He was standing before his flight was impeded by Grimmson’s hand shooting out to grip his wrist, not quite harshly but not really all that friendly either.

“Sit back down, Scamander, I don’t want your money or any promise of it in future. Just a bit of assurance.” His fingers circled Newt’s wrist until they suddenly pushed up under his jumper and found his pulse point with practised ease, “A pint or two once a month should do the trick, just so I can be sure of a few things...and that you know not to mention this service or encounter to anyone else without my express permission.”

Newt’s eyes were wide and terrified by this point and he snatched his arm back, snagging his bag strap and backtracking to the door as quickly as he could. Unfortunately, his way was blocked by two large men who had entered the room without his notice, both gnarled and unpleasant looking and more than ready to use the excessive amount of muscle each possessed. It was at this point that Newt knew he had made a terrible – quite possibly deadly – mistake and that he should have trusted his instincts and never come here in the first place.

“Now Mr Scamander, I would rather do this the easy way but I will not hesitate to use force should you try to leave the premises before I’ve got my assurance. It’s all clean business here, after all,” Grimmson’s voice was as cold as his eyes and Newt found himself backing sideways toward the chipped porcelain sink in an attempt to avoid both the men advancing on him and the crazy bugger still sitting at his desk as though taking blood from people by force was acceptable business etiquette.

Newt’s hand flew to his pocket instinctively, digging out his phone and keying in two 9s on the dial before one of the men dived for him and he was forced to dance back across the room to avoid him. Unfortunately, he backed himself behind Grimmson’s desk and the man chose that moment to stand, seizing Newt by the arm and pulling him closer, the inch the older man had on his height working to Grimmson’s advantage to further intimidate the student. Not that it was really necessary by this point.

“I don’t think you want to be calling the authorities, Scamander, not with the history you have. I took the liberty of doing a little digging into just what brought you to me and I can’t imagine that any of your illegal activities would be worth bringing to the police's attention for the sake of a few pints of blood, now would they?” His tone was almost coaxing and whilst Newt did not hesitate to jerk himself from the older man’s grip, he did let his phone screen fade to black before shoving it back in his coat pocket.

He tried to meet Grimmson’s hard stare but could only find it in himself to raise his gaze to the man’s tense jaw before he asked in a hoarse whisper, “Just a pint...and I’ll still get the money?”

It sounded so easy and as a pleased, thin smile crept across Grimmson's lips, Newt could feel the beginnings of resignation setting in, the elder nodding encouragingly. “That’s right, you’ll get your due, just sit back down and this will all be over with soon.”

“I-...I want to see it first. The money. I want to know you’re good for it,” Newt rushed out the words but Grimmson merely barked out a laugh and nodded, stepping back around the table and opening a locked desk drawer with a key procured from his jacket pocket. He pulled out a sheaf of notes wrapped with a paper tab and Newt could tell even without counting that there must be at least €5000 in there. That should certainly be enough to tide him over until Jacob had gotten around to paying him back. The zoologist swallowed and held a hand out for the money, receiving a sceptical eyebrow raise before Grimmson handed it over for Newt to peruse. It seemed genuine enough and true to Newt’s estimate, there was no less than €7000 there. He looked up to the other man warily but nodded, sitting in the appointed chair, shucking off his coat and going to roll up his sleeves so that his arm was accessible.

Grimmson chuckled lowly, however, clicking his fingers at the two slabs of muscle who came forward and each took a firm hold of Newt’s arms and shoulders, quickly and efficiently pinning him to the chair. He looked up in confusion and dawning fear, however, as Grimmson appeared before him, not with a needle and syringes as he had expected but with a wickedly sharp looking knife and a clear glass jar. He jerked against the men’s grip, wriggling and panicking as he felt the warm weight of Pickett squirming where he had curled up under Newt’s shirt against his side. “No, no, I’ve changed my mind. You can’t do it like-”

Grimmson merely laughed and stepped forward, quickly pressing the blade to the crook of Newt’s arm, the metal coolly kissing a prominent vein there and the student temporarily stilled for fear of it being severed prematurely or in a way against the intention of the knife's wielder. Or at least in the way he _hoped_ the man intended...as far as any cutting could go, really.

“Don’t you worry now, Scamander, I’ve got a steady hand as long as you don’t try anything stupid,” Grimmson explained as he dug the knife into Newt’s flesh, causing Newt to gasp at the sharp sting as blood welled to the surface. He instinctively jerked both at the pain but as he felt Pickett wriggling once more against his side, his unaccosted arm attempted to move to cup his side to still his lizard companion. Blood was running warm and coppery down his arm now, the crimson stream and droplets staining his skin and flowing into the jar that was pressed close to the wound. Grimmson was watching the flow with steady, likely practised eyes but one of the men holding Newt down – the dark-haired one – noticed the way that Newt’s shirt was shifting and called out, aghast, his grip loosening as he stepped back as far as he could whilst still maintaining a tenuous grip on the zoologist.

“What the fuck is that?” he cried, staring at where Pickett was squirming discontentedly, clearly sensing Newt’s own fear and responding in kind by nosing and pushing at the fabric of Newt’s shirt about his stomach, it soon came untucked and the lizard’s small speckled face poked out from just above Newt’s waistline. “Oh, fuck, Christ, it’s a fucking Komoder Dragon or some shite. I _hate_ those things. Watched all about em on the telly,” he looked on fearfully, dull eyes wide and fists clenched at his sides now. “They’re poisonous they are.” 

Newt was tempted to correct him but the fact that the large dark-haired local had released Newt overwhelmed his instinct to properly identify fairly common reptiles. He yanked harder on his captive arm, feeling relief as Pickett chose that moment to crawl up onto Newt’s shoulder, prompting the other muscle-mountain to abruptly release Newt as he heeded his friend’s misguided warnings.

“You idiot, that’s not a goddamn _Komodo_. Too small for a start,” Grimmson snapped, clearly irritated by his hired muscle’s stupidity. Newt took the opportunity to scramble up, clutching his freely bleeding arm to his chest, ignoring the blood that quickly started to soak his shirt and snagged his bag and coat, diving sideways to avoid grasping hands. The less dim mound of muscle lunged for him, tackling the slighter man to the floor with an almighty thump that seemed to jar Newt’s skeleton from his body for a moment and he let out another grunt, kicking out and feeling a thrill of success as he struck flesh and heard a corresponding cry as he pushed himself up again and ran for the door. He cradled Pickett protectively against his chest with his good arm and thumped the door open with the injured one, jolts of fresh pain shooting up and down his arm at the movement.

Newt flinched and sped his step down the corridor as a solid object struck the door frame where his head had been a moment before and glanced back when he heard the thump of multiple pairs of footsteps behind him, giving chase and he broke into a dead sprint. He was beginning to feel increasingly light-headed as blood continued to stream down his arm, his racing heartbeat and dead-on sprint accelerating the blood-loss to increasingly dangerous levels. The zoologist tried to keep his arm elevated as he vaulted down the stairs, taking them perilously fast, two and three at a time and slamming into each wall on each curve of the bannister as his vision threaded itself with grey. He could hear the men close behind him, only a flight above and spared no time to worry about the heavily bleeding wound, he could take care of it when he wasn’t running for his life. If he managed to get away that was.

His battered boots hit concrete as he flung himself out into the street, the quiet, puddled streets surrounding the tower-block empty, dark and unhelpfully rutted by potholes and cracked tarmac. Newt decided that heading towards the city centre would likely be his best option – surely the men pursuing him weren’t reckless enough to accost him in full view of public places. Unfortunately, it would be a long run to get anywhere that populated and Newt wasn’t sure he could make it that far without getting caught or simply passing out. He felt sweat streaming down his face as he flung himself around another corner, wrapping his coat haphazardly around his bleeding arm to try to staunch the flow a little, cursing as his satchel thumped against his side, slowing him down more than he could afford. He hadn’t the mind to abandon it, however, not only for the value of its contents but for the fact that a sudden force collided with him from behind, throwing him to the ground as his foot caught the corner of the pavement. Blazing pain erupted in his back around his right shoulder and though Newt couldn’t see what had hit him in the dark by the chipped concrete water feature, he got the feeling that it had been a brick or perhaps a rock. He forced himself up once more, shoulder and arm throbbing and aching with each thudding step he took, though he couldn’t hear the steps pursuing him anymore past the pounding of blood in his ears or the grey spots that were now largely consuming his vision.

The one thing he managed to focus properly upon, however, was the sleek black car that pulled up on the road across from him, past the fountain and idling as the driver-side window opened. Newt didn’t even think about his decision as he put on a burst of speed, hugging Pickett more firmly against himself and staggering a little when he finally skidded to a halt beside the car, leaning heavily against the roof of it as he peered down to see who had stopped at such an opportune moment. A pale, sharply handsome face greeted his spotting sight, framed by slicked back white-blonde hair and a vivid slash of a mouth marking out surprise and concern in conjunction with the set of the man’s pale brows. Newt was about to gasp in enough breath to ask the man if he could wait by his car and hope that that was enough to deter the men chasing him but was beaten to the mark as a smooth voice spoke with a confidence that compelled Newt almost as much as his own desperation did.

“I think it would be wise if you got in the car before anything other misfortunes befall you tonight.”

There was a click of the door locks and Newt only paused for a few more moments before glancing back over his shoulder to see two familiar lumps of muscle marching purposefully across the square toward him and threw caution to the wind for what felt like the hundredth time that day and sped around the car to fold himself into the passenger seat. The car accelerated away smoothly and Newt didn’t have much time left to reconsider his decision as they began to travel along the streets of Dublin, pulling out onto a more main road that proved to be better trafficked mere minutes later. 

Newt took the sudden reprieve and his ability to breathe properly once more to turn to the man sitting beside him with a grateful smile and hesitant voice, “Thank you, I really don’t know what I would have done had you not arrived when you did.”

“It’s quite alright, Mr…?”

“Scamander. Newt, that is. Newt Scamander,” the zoologist supplied quickly, adjusting Pickett once more so that the lizard could rest easier in the top of Newt’s open satchel rather than clutched frantically against his bloodied chest. Wincing as he noticed the blood was dripping down onto the fancy leather seats of the car and he turned an apologetic gaze upward quickly, not wanting to antagonise his timely saviour. “Sorry, I can get out now if you’d just let me out here and-”

“Nonsense, it's leather. It will wipe clean,” the man chided, waving a hand dismissively even as his dark eye never left the road ahead, something for which Newt felt immensely grateful both for his usual aversion for eye contact and for the mess he had bodily thrown himself into tonight. He couldn’t imagine what this stranger could think of him.

“Now where exactly shall I be escorting you, this evening?”

Newt flushed lightly at the eloquently phrased question and mumbled, “Anywhere around Phoenix Park would be terrific, thank you, but you really don’t have to. I appreciate your assistance more than I can really say but you’ve already done more than enough.”

He glanced out of the window at the rain-soaked streets, seeing more people occupying the orange lit walkways as they hit the more central part of the city, the car slowed at a set of traffic lights but soon started up again, turning left and Newt looked at the driver askance, “Uh, where are we going exactly?”

“To the hospital,” the older man responded evenly, as though it were obvious, glancing pointedly at the younger man as he did so and Newt shook his head hastily in response.

“No, no, I’m quite alright, I don’t need to go to the hospital.”

He couldn’t afford to do so for one thing and he would really rather just get home for another and crash out on his bed. Perhaps for a week or two. His shoulder was killing him and the grey spots had yet to completely disappear from his vision. Newt looked up again from his hazed, pained contemplation as the man pulled over on the side of a road, just by a well-lit section of pavement adjoining a bus stop and the two turned to properly face each other for the first time since the impromptu rescue.

The first thing that struck Newt was that the man’s eyes were not both dark as he had initially thought but mismatched – one an icy silver-blue and the other a deeper brown that bordered black. The effect could have been eerie, like one of the cosmetic sets of contacts that Newt had seen people wear at Halloween but instead, it only proved to cast the man’s sharp features into a contrastingly ethereal and natural light. The streetlight dipped the brown warmer into a more normal shadow whilst the silver-blue shone bright and captivating in the dim light of the dashboard. The man’s face was smooth, clear of hair and boasted a flawless complexion that defied the thin lines of crow’s-feet that kissed the edges of his eyes. He wore a crisply cut, dark jacket, pinstripe trousers, waistcoat and white dress shirt to a flattering degree of tailoring – not tight per se but enough to accentuate a well-toned figure and broad shoulders. A silver chain glistened against his waist, dipping from a pocket watch and curving past his hip into the folds of his well-tailored, blood-red silk-lined jacket.

All in all, Newt couldn’t help but stare a little bit, entranced both by the man’s striking appearance and by the way the rain streaming down the windscreen made the zoologist feel like he was encapsulated in some sort of tropical fish tank, small and insulated, protected from the outside world and suspended in water and light. The drabness and darkness of the rest of the night gone even as the world itself had not changed much at all. The man’s keen eyes were trained on him too and Newt flushed slightly brighter than he reckoned his face could go with the amount of blood loss. He shook himself and offered the man a weary smile as he realised that in his preoccupation, the elder had said something and was apparently awaiting a reply that Newt’s addled mind caught up with far too slowly and he blinked. “Sorry, what did you say?” 

The man seemed unphased though his pale brows creased slightly together as he repeated, “I suggested that as I just found you accosted, blood-soaked and alone in the street, a trip to the hospital would most likely not go amiss, however, if you truly do not wish it, then I will still escort you home. Wherever that may be.” There was a clear question tagged onto the end of the polite words and Newt hesitated, shuffling his bag awkwardly in his lap before he answered.

“I think I’m alright, it's just a scratch, really, see for yourself,” he moved aside his now ruined coat to reveal the sluggishly still bleeding cut which had thankfully slowed to a less worrying rate. The man looked unconvinced, however, as he reached a pale hand forward to brush over Newt’s injured shoulder in a careful touch that still drew a hiss from the zoologist as pain shot through him and he jerked away as though burned.

“That hardly seems like nothing. In fact, if I’m not mistaken, I believe there may be a fracture in your shoulder blade,” the man looked like he was more than ready to reach forward again and Newt crowded himself further into the other side of the seat, shaking his head as words slipped from his lips faster than he could properly consider them.

“And how would you know? I think that you should leave that sort of assessment to the medical professionals seeing as you seem so keen on getting me to one.”

The man’s eyebrow arched to an impressive degree and one corner of his lip twitched up into something that might almost have been a smile, “You might be right. However, I happen to _be_ a medical professional so my assessments are likely better than most.”

Newt was left dumbfounded for a few seconds before he regained the proper sense to avert his gaze and offer a sheepish reply, “Well, I suppose that would certainly be true. Sorry, it’s been-…a rather rough night.”

“Really,” The man replied dryly, “I couldn’t have noticed.”

That drew a genuine chuckle from Newt and once he started, the grin that followed came much easier than any he had felt in weeks. The stranger’s laugh mingled with his own, a deep, rich sound that sent a slight shiver through Newt that had little to do with the blood loss, pain, exhaustion and cold, in fact, he was finding the stranger’s car pleasantly warm and belatedly realised that the man must’ve put the heaters on at some point since they started driving as the leather he sat upon was now toasty and smelled pleasantly of some cologne or spice that he couldn’t quite place. He shook himself again and managed to organise his scattered thoughts enough to properly concentrate on their conversation once more. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t catch your name…did I?” he asked, tagging on the last part just in case he had spaced out on more than he thought but the man merely offered him a thin smile and held out his hand in an oddly formal fashion which Newt took, awkwardly gripping it over the gearstick and finding the grip firm, cool and smooth; a confident approach. 

“You didn’t. Doctor Gellert Grindelwald, at your service.” And as they withdrew, Newt couldn’t help but inwardly agree, yes, this man – this utter stranger – had already come to his aid out of nowhere. A doctor, no less and a kind seeming man who had offered a blood-soaked, injured, hunted stranger a lift without second thought.

“I suppose you’re wondering what all that was about,” Newt hedged and the man offered him a slight shrug of his shoulders as one hand drifted back to rest upon the wheel. Newt chose to elaborate anyway, feeling the need to vent a little of the oddness and absurdity of the night upon someone. Anyone, really. “I’ve run into a jot of rather awful luck recently and a friend of mine suggested I go to an associate of hers for help.” He took a deep, steadying breath that exhaled into a pained laugh as his shoulder flared anew with pain at the exaggerated movement, “As you can likely guess, it didn’t go very well. The chap was somewhat of a lunatic and tried to bleed me as some sort of demented tax for lending me money. I came to my senses rather quickly and got out of there but, well…I don’t imagine I would’ve made it far had you not been there when you were.” He paused before asking, “Why were you there, may I ask? It’s not exactly a reputable part of the city and you…you certainly don’t seem like you need to borrow any money.”

The man – Grindelwald – laughed, and appeared to become almost a touch sheepish himself, rubbing a hand through his hair and pushing the loose strands back into the shining style with a ringed finger. “I’ll admit I didn’t intend to be there at all, I had stopped to recalculate my route as my phone had lost signal and when it regained it, I was a mile out of where I should be. I was heading back from doing a house visit with a patient of mine when I noticed you and your pursuers.” His brows knitted in apparent consternation, “I wouldn’t have felt right leaving anyone alone in such circumstances. Let alone such a striking young man such as yourself.” 

Newt’s cheeks flared anew and he ducked his head, his gaze fixing on the speedometer past the man’s torso before he dared speak again, “I really don’t know what I can say to that…apart from thank you, ah, again?” 

“Ah, but I can see that I’ve made you uncomfortable. I apologise, it was not my intention,” Grindelwald thankfully pushed smoothly onward before Newt had to fumble a reply, “Well, I think that if you are not amenable to a hospital visit, I could take care of your injuries myself if you allowed me to drive you somewhere with suitable light and privacy? I can understand that you would likely not want a stranger to enter your home, most especially after what you have experienced tonight.”

“No, no, I-…I would very much appreciate it. Is there anything I could do for you in return? I mean I obviously don’t have any money but-” he cut himself off with an embarrassed flush as he realised how that sounded but once again, Grindelwald proved a thoroughly merciful, polite and intuitive companion as he raised a hand and spoke before the student could embarrass himself further. 

“You owe me nothing, Mr Scamander, I would not be upholding my Hippocratic oath if I did not offer assistance to those in need, even if it has been some years since I practised practical medicine.” At Newt’s wary look he chuckled and quickly amended, “I work in psychiatric circles now but I am still a fully qualified and skilled surgeon, have no fear. I merely decided to pursue the psychiatric route as both a change of scenery and as something that united a personal interest and my pre-existing education.” 

Newt nodded, feeling Pickett squirming in his bag as he instinctively sought the heat of the air vents and the zoologist chuckled, lifting him out to cradle him in his lap, closer to the sources of heat and as a deeper comfort to both. He felt Grindelwald’s eyes linger upon the reptile and offered a rueful smile, “Sorry, I’m being rude, aren’t I? This is Pickett, he’s a Sand Lizard. Completely harmless, though he has a tendency to be rather grumpy and petulant if I leave him anywhere so he more often than not ends up coming with me.”

Mismatched eyes examined Newt’s companion closely and with avid interest that had something spark warmly in Newt’s chest for the appreciation of his closest companion, “He’s on the older side, isn’t he? Been with you quite a while, I imagine, to show you that level of affection?”

Newt nodded, impressed despite himself, “Yes, about twelve years now. He was a present from my mum.”

“I take it your family is not local?” Grindelwald inquired as he pulled out onto the road again, turning around and heading back toward the area Newt had mentioned and the zoologist shook his head.

“No, from a village in Dorset originally but now we’re spread all over the place, really. My brother’s back in London and my mum never sticks anywhere very long anymore.” He looked sideways at the older man before venturing, “You’re not local either, are you?” His accent was English, though had a twang of something else to it, perhaps something Nordic in origin, though it was subtle enough so that Newt couldn’t quite pinpoint it.

Grindelwald nodded, turning and crossing a roundabout with enviable ease around the angrier late-night drivers, “I have lived in a great number of places in my life but settled down here nearly two years ago to start my psychiatric practice. I like to think that I’ve settled in well.”

“Seems so,” Newt murmured, eying the man’s expensive attire and the luxurious car. He was no expert, but he couldn’t imagine any of it came cheap. He saw the turning to his road coming up and directed the older man who obliged by following Newt’s directions until he was able to pull up on the road opposite Newt’s place. The flat was on the very bottom of a larger house of exposed brick, the only place in the building that his landlord had said that he could keep as many animals as he did and Newt cursed quietly under his breath as he noticed that the window at pavement level was ablaze with artificial light, meaning that he’d left his lights on again. He often forgot to switch them off as many of the creatures in his care preferred some light and couldn’t get it much through the singular tiny window. However, it did nothing to help either the environment or his utility bills.

Feeling a sudden rush of self-consciousness for his shabby accommodation, he unclicked his seatbelt and glanced over at Grindelwald. “I should be alright from here...thank you again for your...help.”

“I would say it was a pleasure but I do not believe that meeting under such circumstances as you described would count as a particularly pleasant experience, so instead I will merely wish you a better evening and a speedy recovery.” His critical gaze drifted to Newt’s injured shoulder once more with evident dubiousness before he added, “I really do encourage you to get that seen to.”

“I will,” Newt promised, despite knowing that he wouldn’t be able to afford it. He reached for the door handle and was halfway out of the car before he glanced back to the man that had saved him, a sudden burst of something flooding through him at the realisation that this would most likely be their one and only meeting. He dug his hand into his pocket and retrieved his phone, turfing it out in record time and holding it out to the suave stranger with his tainted-green eyes fixed firmly on the man’s reflection in the car window behind him in preference to the real thing. “Um, just in case I think of a way to repay you for your help tonight or come into enough money to properly compensate you, would you mind, ah, leaving me with your number?” He risked a glance up to Grindelwald’s face which proved inscrutable for a moment or two before it cracked out into a genuine smile and he began typing into Newt’s phone with ease, his thumb blurring across the screen before he handed it back to the zoologist with a wry smile.

“And if you change your mind about my offer, feel free to call me. I’m usually free during most evenings and Friday afternoons.” His fingers brushed briefly against Newt’s bloodied wrist and something odd flashed in his eyes so fast Newt almost wasn’t sure he’d seen it before it was gone and replaced by a tempered warmth. “It was interesting meeting you, now do get inside before you catch your death.”

Newt nodded, a slight shiver running through him as he shoved the car door closed, fumbling his keys from his pocket and managing to get all the way into his crowded flat before he finally let the exhaustion wash over him in earnest. He let his bag, shoes and bloodied clothes all fall to the floor in a messy heap as he stripped down for a shower, leaving Pickett to his warm terrarium and stepping under a cool stream of water before it had even had a chance to properly heat up yet. He hissed as he scrubbed the dried layers of blood free from his skin and glared at the cut that decided to start weeping blood again as the clotted gore washed off. The redhead didn’t dare risk shower gel or shampoo for sheer tiredness and fear of it aggravating his wounds so simply scrubbed over himself in a cursory manner with his flannel before towelling off carefully.

Newt took care to bathe the cut in saltwater and Savlon, muttering colourful curses and sweating the whole while, he then wrapped it in some gauze and oversized novelty spiderman plasters that Jacob had gotten him ages ago as a joke. The young zoologist smiled down tiredly at the haphazard job he had done and groaned as his shoulder decided to remind him loudly of the damage it had taken when Newt started trying to get his pyjamas on. He awkwardly managed to get an okay look at it in his bathroom cupboard door mirror and inwardly winced as he saw the deep red marking and purpling centre that indicated some pretty nasty bone-deep bruising would be setting in by morning. Signing that off as tomorrow Newt’s problem, the exhausted young man chugged down a pint glass of water, two paracetamol and collapsed himself onto his bed, falling asleep quicker than he could remember doing in a long time. What followed him into that sleep was a hectic mix of dingy offices, rain-soaked streets, shining blades and mismatched eyes that watched over him as he slept. The odd thing was, was that despite that, Newt didn’t lose a wink.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback and kudos craved like cookies and whump... :)


	3. My skin peels off like paint

_13 th October_

Newt awoke with such a groan that Monty, Helga and Lila startled awake, the latter of which leapt from the bed with a high yip and the two cats choosing to vent their displeasure in a traditionally feline manner by latching their needle-like claws into both the bedcovers and the agonized zoologist that lay beneath them. He flailed for a few undignified moments before he managed to extricate himself out from under his quadrupedal roommates and promptly crashed back to the floor as a wave of dizziness and hurt hit him. Newt pressed his back to the edge of the bed, awkwardly angled so that his right shoulder did not flare anew but groaning lowly as he massaged the stiff, painful area. His arm flared sharply with pins and needles that started at his fingertips and fired signals back into his shoulder region and the whole awful cycle bounced back upon itself. The plaster had peeled off his cut at some point during the night but thankfully the sheets he had been cocooned in were only spotted with a little blood, the wound having mostly scabbed over even if it still looked and felt rather ghastly: a brutal red slash against his pale, freckled skin. He’d had worse cuts even if they had never before been inflicted under such aberrant and terrifying circumstances.

Feeling hunger gnaw deep in his stomach, Newt looked to the cupboards and fridge that he knew to be empty save for a half-empty bag of flour and a half bottle of ketchup that would be of no use with no other ingredients available. He let his eyes slip closed again as he recalled the disastrous Hail Mary that he had attempted the night before and felt the leaden weight within him double as he realised that it had all been for nothing. He was still destitute; facing being kicked out of his flat, unable to feed either himself or those in his care and that reality, coupled with the agony strumming his body, finally brought tears to bubble behind his eyes. He pressed a shaking hand to his face, feeling some tiny sense of relief as Lila limped back across the floor towards him and crawled up his outstretched legs to curl into his lap. She nuzzled his hand, probably looking for food, but Newt felt more sobs wrack him as he knew he had no more to give.

He stroked his good hand through her short red fur, absently pulling out bits of dust and fluff that he found there and smiling through his tears at the realisation that she had probably gone digging under the loose floorboard in his kitchen again; a space she always seemed to favour despite the number of times he’d had to coax her out of the cramped cubby hole. And in that moment, Newt couldn’t help but wish for such a little spot of darkness, warmth and safety himself. Somewhere he could hide away from his problems and that could prove a simple comfort as it did to the fox. Sadly, that was not an option. He was a human and had to deal with human problems in a human way…if only he could think of a way in which he could actually do that. 

Newt let out another moan as he forced himself up, cradling Lila to his chest as he levered himself stiffly upright by leaning heavily on the bed, he placed her carefully down on the closed top of the laundry basket. Newt chivvied the cats off the bed to strip and wash the stained sheets, along with the soiled clothes from the night before. The battered washing machine clunked to life when coaxed and Monty gave it his customary untrusting glare before going to hide under Newt’s sofa, watching the machine with a malice reserved only for it and the vacuum cleaner. One that rarely got used as a result.

Newt’s contemplation of his socked feet after he began to get dressed was broken as his phone sounded from somewhere in the room, he startled for the second time that morning and glanced about, turfing aside a number of stray objects and animals before he found the ringing device stowed in the side pocket of his satchel. He retrieved it and sighed as he saw it was Queenie; possibly the best-case call right now, instead of his landlord or someone else that was seeking money he didn’t have.

“…Hey, Queenie.”

“Newt! You absolute jackass! Why didn’t you call me? What happened? Did you get the money?”

“I’m sorry I didn’t call last night, I was very tired and it…didn’t go so well,” he hedged, looking through his bag and digging out his books and the old empty wrappers from the bottom for want of something to do with his trembling hands. He froze, however, as his fingers and eyes landed upon something that most certainly did _not_ belong in there. 

“Oh crap, honey, I’m sorry, what happened?”

He hesitated, staring at the object in his hand in utter shock and only managed to make a few noises that resembled, “Ah, ah, ah, um.”

“Newt?” Queenie’s voice toned back into his consciousness and he jerked physically, dropping the thing back into his bag. “Newt, honey, are you having a stroke or something?”

“Ah, no, I’m fine, I’ll…call you back, but everything is okay.”

“Newt-” but he was already hanging up and letting the phone drop to his lap as he stared at the wad of bills that had been tucked into the front pocket of his satchel. The exact wad of bills that he had _thought_ Grimmson had denied him the night before. But there it was, all €7000 in clean notes and wrapped in that little paper tab. Now that he looked closely, Newt could even see a tiny ‘GG’ marked on the tab: Grimmson’s initials. He thought back frantically to the previous night, trying his very best to remember when he could’ve taken the money but drawing up blank past the point where he had inspected it and then been pinned to the chair for the coerced blood-letting. Newt supposed that it could’ve dropped into his bag by accident or perhaps, in his hurry, he might’ve stashed it in there on his way out but he honestly couldn’t remember and it wasn’t like there was anywhere else it could’ve come from. 

He let out a half-hysterical laugh, quickly clapping a hand over his mouth to stifle the sound before he scraped it back over his face and through his bed-headed mop of copper curls. He had the money! And though it had cost him more stress, fear and discomfort than he ever hoped to experience again, he wasn’t going to be either evicted, starved or unable to care for his creatures. He tore the tab open, flicking through the notes to check it was all there and real and not some stress-induced hallucination or something of the sort, letting out another laugh as he realised it seemed genuine enough. He froze as he made to stand, however, at the thought of what Grimmson and his goons might do once they discovered the money was no longer in their possession; they hadn’t exactly seemed like reasonable folk after all. If Grimmson knew about Newt’s activist work and knew Queenie, he could see no reason why the man wouldn’t either know or be able to find out where he lived and worked. He could still be in serious danger. Newt couldn’t imagine that Grimmson was the forgiving sort or that he would appreciate being cheated out of his desire for blood – literally or otherwise.

However, until that became a more pressing issue, Newt decided that he was better off sorting out the more imminent issues such as the gnawing hunger in his gut, the discontented animals twining about his feet and the landlord living two floors up who wanted a chunk of the money Newt currently held in his shaking hands. Hell, with this amount, he might even be able to afford to go get his shoulder and arm looked at. Speaking of which, he blinked at the resurgence of the memories of his timely and handsome saviour, the recollections of the man sending a sharp tingle through him. He dug out his phone again, momentarily ignoring the stream of worried texts from Queenie and swiping through to his contacts list, noting the most recent one being logged helpfully under the Doctor’s full title and with both a home and mobile number listed underneath as well as an email address. Newt’s brows rose at the realisation that the man had not only fulfilled his request as a courtesy but seemed to hold some genuine concern that Newt have a way to contact him if he should feel the need to take him up on his offer of care. Feeling the way his shoulder flared every time he moved and the crunching, clicking sounds that suffused the joints surrounding it, he couldn’t help but think that Doctor Gellert Grindelwald might well have been right about the fracture.

He checked the clock on his phone and smiled slightly at Queenie’s tactic of getting him off work today. Unfortunately, he still had lectures from 2pm into the evening, but as it was only a little past nine now, he still had plenty of time to make it over there after restocking his cupboards from the Aldi down the road and popping upstairs to pay Mr Worme. He glanced toward the washing machine, rather irked as he knew he wasn’t getting his clothes or coat back from it for at least another hour and that they would take three times that long to dry on his air dryer even if he placed it near the warmest radiator in the place. Resigning himself to having to simply layer up against the cold outside, he pulled on another jumper and squeezed a corduroy jacket that had once belonged to Jacob over the bulky layers, wrapping his scarf around his neck with another barely stifled moan as his shoulder objected loudly. His gloves had been worn through to the state that only three fingertips were now covered on each hand but he tugged them on anyway and headed out the door.

By mid-afternoon, Newt’s whole body was aching with a fierce finality that made it feel as though his shoulders and back had permanently set into the tension of sustained agony. Carrying the shopping bags back had been a lesson in torment as each step and flex of muscles he didn’t even realise he possessed had sent pain shooting through him and he’d received more than a few odd looks at his hunched position and the low hisses he often emitted as he moved about the crowded shop. Getting back inside his warm flat, unloading the shopping and managing to fill his empty belly with cheesy beans on toast, tea and an apple or two had been such a relief that he had almost decided to skip his lectures that afternoon...but then he had decided that he wouldn’t be doing himself or his education any favours by missing them. He was paying extortionate fees each year and he wasn’t about to waste it; not to mention the fact that there was fieldwork planned for the next week that relied upon the theory done today and earlier in the semester. The practical work was the part that Newt lived for, the time he got to spend with animals in both the Murlough National Nature Reserve and Dublin Zoo itself - the university holding useful links with both so that the students could make connections and study without incurring excessive fees from either attraction. 

He took another dose of paracetamol and chugged down the rest of his tea with it before tending to his flat compatriots with a care he hadn’t been able to bestow upon them until he had the proper funds to do so. The cats got extra helpings of tuna and kibble, Lila got the medicine he had picked up from the vet two streets over from the shop and some cheap cuts of liver and kidney that he had got from the sale section. Whilst Pickett had not been much the worse for Newt’s poverty, as his diet consisted mostly of insects and things that Newt could forage from the park nearby, the zoologist did gift his reptilian friend with some flower heads he’d snagged and shared out more vegetation and dried insects than he usually might with the other herbivores.

By the time he’d fed and cared for all twenty-two creatures living in his flat, he was pushing the time he needed to be leaving at and though he knew he could now afford the bus, he didn’t see much point in squandering his dodgily-gotten wealth too quickly. Lord knows whenever he might get a return on the money that he had leant Jacob. Still, he was at least getting paid at the end of next week and with all the overtime he’d been doing, he was looking forward to a significant wage slip coming in to help subsidise the money he had not been expecting to have. Repayment of the money was most definitely a priority and he could only endeavour to both work more hours and do anything he could to ensure the success of Jacob’s business so that he might be repaid all the sooner himself.

As he began his walk, his body deciding that now was the time to complain anew the damage done to it, his phone rang again and this time he had to fight a grin and he answered the call with a significantly less horrible feeling clawing at his insides, “Yes, I know, Queenie. I’m a jackass, but just so you know, it all worked out alright. I managed to get the money and everything. I’m on my way into class at the mo but I should be able to catch up with you later if you’d like?”

“I’m not sure,” began a completely unexpected voice, and Newt almost tripped over the curb as he stopped dead in his tracks, “whether I would describe ignoring your health so blatantly as ‘jackassery’, but I certainly wouldn’t class it as entirely wise either.”

“Ah, I’m sorry, I didn’t-” he licked his lips and swallowed as he began walking again albeit at a slower pace than before. “I didn’t expect you to be the one calling me, Mr Grindelwald, er, Doctor, sorry, again.”

“Gellert, please,” the doctor corrected and a quiet chuckle hummed across the line, “And it’s quite alright, I merely thought to check in to ensure you were in better condition than you were when last we spoke. I will admit there was part of me that was concerned you might have a concussion to accompany with that fracture.” 

“No, no concussion, or at least I don’t expect so, I didn’t get hit on the head at any rate.”

“Well, that’s a relief to hear,” came the dry reply, “How’s the shoulder? Any swelling? How’s the movement in it?”

Newt massaged the area in question with one hand, hissing in pain as his body protested the motion aggressively and he let his hand drop to hang briefly at his side before it clutched reflexively onto his satchel strap and began picking at the old flakes of dry leather. “There’s a little swelling,” he admitted, “hurts a fair deal too but I can still move it alright.”

“Very well,” there was a pause on the other end of the line as Newt paused at some traffic lights, waiting to cross before he heard, “Would you be averse to a house visit if you are still set against an advisable visit to A&E?”

Newt blinked rapidly, face heating slightly, “Actually, I was planning to go to the hospital soon. Maybe tomorrow as I have some free time then.” He gnawed on his lip before hedging, “But I suppose I might be willing to put it off if you would allow me to compensate you for all your help?”

Another chuckle from the doctor sent something warm shooting through Newt and he couldn’t help but smile into his phone, head dipping to avoid the looks from passers-by, “Oh would you now? I believe I should count myself fortunate.”

“Maybe you should,” Newt teased before shaking himself slightly; he was flirting with a much older man and a stranger at that - a doctor who had taken pity on him, and Newt was probably just making him uncomfortable. He wasn’t great at guessing social cues or anything like this. He hadn’t attempted flirting with anyone this far out of his league in three years or more, though Queenie had often been very exasperated to inform him that he’d apparently missed others flirting with him. However, assuming that an older – likely heterosexual - man was suggesting anything more than a professional concern or something akin to chivalry, well, it was quite ridiculous indeed.

“So would you prefer to meet somewhere more public or private? As I said last night, I can well understand why you might not want to meet alone with an almost complete stranger.”

Newt felt slightly encouraged that he was being offered the option and ventured, “I know a good coffee place in the Temple bar area if you don’t mind? It's quiet but serves good drinks.”

“Not at all, send me the address and a time that is convenient for you. I should let you get on with your studies.”

“Thank you, I should be free around four tomorrow if that’s convenient?”

“Closer to five would suit better, I have patients up until shortly before then and I would rather have some time to clear my head a little beforehand.” 

“Yes, of course, wonderful.” 

“Excellent. If you change your mind, let me know.”

“Shall do, see you tomorrow then,” Newt hung up and sped his step to make up for the slow pace he’d maintained as they spoke.

Newt was just outside of the campus when he realised that he had just arranged to have a coffee with a total stranger so that said stranger could examine his bare back, and factoring in the fact that Newt had offered to pay the man for the whole encounter...Bloody hell, what sort of a convoluted mess had he gotten himself into? It sounded both ludicrous and awkward in the extreme and the zoologist was forced to duck into the bathroom nearest his classroom for a few moments to gather himself and stop internally debating whether he should just call back and cancel. In the end, he instead sent the address of the coffee shop to Gellert’s number and stuffed his phone back in his bag as he hastened to get to class, snagging one of the free seats at the back of the lecture hall. Newt told himself quite firmly that the situation wasn’t all as stupid as it sounded but also resolved that if he had his way, no one – especially Queenie – would find out about it. At least not how he had met the man or answered the phone to him, anyway.

With that resolve in mind, Newt got through the next few hours of lectures without too much mishap, only having to pause towards the end of the second lecture to chug down more water and painkillers as the pain decided to resurface with a vengeance. Aside from the severe cramps in his back and shoulder that his note-taking posture had aggravated, the lectures proved interesting and he even managed to work with a friend of his from first year, Jared, whom he had seen little of recently due to the man’s busy social life that often seemed to interrupt his education. Newt politely turned down the offer of a drink that night as he doubted that mixing his recent string of bad luck, painkillers, blood loss, shoulder injuries and alcohol was a good idea. It wasn’t like he went out that much anyway, although he had to admit that the last time he’d gone out with Jared had been fun, well, up until the slightly older man had gotten into a fight, been flipped over a table by some bigoted louts and ended up being cautioned by the police. The Texan had a way of making usually dull and awkward places such as clubs and pubs feel an easier place to be and combined with Queenie and her group of friends’ generally easy-going nature, Newt had ended up having a pretty good night. Not that he planned on having such a night anytime soon, however - once or twice a year was plenty for him. 

It had occurred to him a few times that it was odd how few of his friends were locals to Dublin but then he supposed that it was a big city, it really wasn’t that strange that people gravitated there – there was a lot to it, it was still a part of Europe and held a unique culture and flavour all of its own. Besides, Queenie had moved there mainly because Jacob had been offered a culinary scholarship there, in addition to Newt’s personal recommendation from his undergraduate years. She had then received her sponsorship from her mysterious investor and decided to put it to use with a business degree with which to complement Jacob’s goals. Jared had moved from the States ‘following his heart’ he said, as his boyfriend was originally from the area before their inevitable split. They had then been off and on again for as long as Newt had known the swarthy Texan, but Newt had never actually met him – a busy guy, Jared often told him, but Newt couldn’t help but begrudgingly admire his friend’s ability to roll with the metaphorical punches that life gave him.

He supposed that was what he was doing now too: adapting to the situations that were thrown at him and accepting help that he admittedly needed. But it wasn’t just that either, this man intrigued him even if he also unnerved him a little; Newt was bad with meeting new people at the best of times and being taken so thoroughly off guard by a handsome, suave, educated and seemingly interested stranger...well, it had been some time since he’d even considered wanting to take such a risk. Granted, the last time he had gambled on such a front, it had not ended well, but he couldn’t help but feel that the years and his friends' and family's encouragement for him to ‘get himself out there’ must mean something. It wasn’t like he hadn’t dated casually in the meantime, he was no hermit, but he also didn’t find that that sort of thing came particularly easy to him – he studied enough biology to know that having carnal needs wasn’t anything abnormal or to be ashamed of but neither did it make any of the human interaction easier. Or the slew of complicated feelings that came along with it.

The day ended considerably less dramatically awfully than the previous one had but Newt found that he was filled with such energy; jittery and unable to simply settle in for the evening. He lingered a while in his flat, trying and failing to relax and spending time with the animal companions that seemed oddly disinterested in his comings and goings today before Newt gave up and decided to go for a walk. He left Pickett in his terrarium and headed out the door, making his way over to the park and taking his time enjoying the brisk night air and the quiet of the green area of the otherwise bustling city. On his way back, he stopped to buy some ice cream and biscuits to crush up onto it from the corner shop, also picking up a paper whilst he was at it when he saw a headline that triggered a memory from something Theseus had mentioned a while back. It highlighted a string of killings within the city – three in total thus far – that had resulted in apparently gory scenes being splattered across the cityscape like something out of a crime thriller. There were no pictures featured within the article, but the sub-heading boasted a link to a website where leaked photos could apparently be found by those who were old enough– or basically anyone who knew how to fake being eighteen by clicking on a box and putting in a random birthdate. That aside, Newt snagged the paper anyway, paid and left, making his way back to his flat slowly. 

Whilst sloppily written, the article reminded Newt of the cases his brother had relayed to him on one of the last calls they’d managed to arrange. There had been a cannibalistic killer in London some years ago that had been linked to a new line of investigation in Dublin – young to middle-aged men being murdered and found violently displayed in a variety of disturbing ways. Organs missing and corpses cocooned in their own dried and preserved flesh. Theseus hadn’t said too much on the matter; simply encouraged Newt to be careful. That had been nearly two weeks ago, Newt having not wanted to risk his elder brother finding out about his financial state as he was wont to do with his busybody tendencies.

Now, as he perused the article that outlined the preliminaries of the investigations, he could see why Theseus had urged him to be cautious – these men had disappeared for days on end and then appeared gutted and displayed by what the article suggested was a cannibalistic serial killer. It was sketchy on the majority of details but the graphic speculations still shook Newt. It was shocking to hear anything of a modern-day serial killer, let alone an honest-to-God cannibal in the very city in which he lived. Most of the ones he'd ever heard of were either fictional or decades-old from books and crime documentaries; Theseus had always been a pain to watch such things with when they were younger as he would go on about how inaccurate and ridiculous most of them were but Newt had never much minded.

There was no harm in indulging fantasies every now and then, was there? Granted, fantasy could often lead to full-blown delusion, but having a vivid imagination or a clear view of how you wanted the world to be was not always a bad thing. However, Newt had also learned the hard way that idealism should be mediated by realism unless you wanted to have your dreams crushed into the ground so repeatedly and so thoroughly that it sometimes made it hard to get out of bed in the morning.

Newt ended up curled on his bed along with Pickett, Lila, Monty, Helga and two of the ferrets – Leo and Mal – as he watched some crappy TV crime drama and munched his way through a bowl of cookies and peanut-butter-chocolate chunk ice-cream. It wasn’t a habit he indulged himself in too often, mind you, but after the month and week he’d had, he couldn’t help but feel that he deserved it. He did come to regret it a little later as both the ice-cream in his stomach and pain in his shoulder decided to gang up on him with a vengeance and make him feel sick to his stomach. He downed more paracetamol before brushing his teeth and getting ready for bed with a slow, stiff ache that lumbered his every movement.

When he finally curled up under the covers, surrounded by various contended, purring, humming and grumbling creatures, he found himself drifting off pretty quickly, though this night, his dreams were not quite so empty as before. He dreamt that he was walking through the park again as he had mere hours ago but this time, it felt as though he were being watched. It wasn’t an obvious feeling; not the kind that tingled the hairs on your arms or made you check over your shoulder, but the kind that set an uneasy reeling in your stomach, the kind that had the backs of your eyes itching fuzzy for no discernible reason. Except that it was. In the dream, he walked and walked and walked without ever seeming to move a step past the same mirror glass frozen lake. A lake he didn’t remember being in the section of Phoenix Park he had ever visited. The smooth, dark surface seemed to undulate and ripple underneath the ice whilst never drifting an inch and it almost hurt to look at for too long; like the grass verge into deep, dark waters was as stationary as it should be but the water was moving ever closer. Both invasively destructive and supportively resolute.

When he awoke the next morning to the blare of his alarm, Newt felt oddly spaced, rolling out of bed and doing the normal things he did to prepare for the day but feeling an indeterminable excitement running through him – not ecstatic exactly, more apprehensive. Thankfully, Lila seemed to be doing better than before, her aggressive spats having petered out and her limp less pronounced than before even if her gait was still a little crooked. She chose to rest upon his bed whilst the fledgeling zoologist got dressed and snagged his bag, notes, coat and wallet, ready to head out the door before he changed his mind and threw himself back towards the chest of drawers that housed his meagre clothes selection.

He pulled off his holey jumper and took out the dark green smart jacket that he had originally worn to Theseus’ wedding six years before but had subsequently lost the trousers and tie to when he had been called upon to wrangle an irate terrier-cross that had escaped her owner and come across Newt’s path on his way back to his hotel. Thinking of his meeting later that day, Newt shrugged the jacket on over his aching, bone-deep-bruised shoulder and back and paused by his mirror to attempt to scruff his hair into something close to order. Queenie often joked that he looked like he rolled out of bed with a perfect ‘cute, curly bedhead’ look but Newt just found it annoying; his hair never seemed to want to do what he wanted. It floofed up at the slightest breeze and chose on a daily basis whether it would attract twigs, leaves, shed scales and whatever debris he happened to come into contact with.

Newt gave up on it quickly, brushing his teeth and fleeing his flat so that he might catch the next bus three minutes down the road rather than being forced to jog the distance into work. He was lucky but spent the whole ride over playing with his phone as it sat in his lap, open at the contacts page and his thumb hovering over the contact labelled as Doctor Gellert Grindelwald. Newt tried to tell himself that it was the peculiarity to the man’s name and the circumstances under which they met that had him so intrigued but he couldn’t shake the feeling that this check-up in a coffee place of his choosing was going to be significant in some way or another. If nothing else, it could be what pushed him into actually going to the hospital and getting something that could relieve him of the agony igniting his shoulders every time he moved…or even if he didn’t. But then again, it could also be something more.

When he arrived at the shop, he barely had ten seconds to dump his stuff in the backroom before he was set upon by a pink and blonde blur that resembled something close to an irate Barbie doll being thrown at him full speed. He had to contain hisses and groans of pain as her arms wrapped swiftly around his aching, flaring shoulders for mere moments before she began hitting him admonishingly on said area and he was forced to retreat, arms raised and gasping in agony. “Queenie, Queenie! A little gentler in you please!”

“You utter ass, Newt Scamander! I’ve been worried sick about you and you didn’t even have the decency to text me or something?” He rolled his aching shoulders, grimacing as they flared anew, which Queenie picked up on quickly and her eyes softened as they drifted to the way Newt was hunched around his right side and the sting of tears glimmering in his eyes at the pain racing through him. “What happened?”

 _“Oh nothing, just had a run-in with your friend Mr Grimmson. His idea of interest on a money loan was slicing my arm open and when I made it clear that I wasn’t very happy with that, he and his men decided to play a game of ‘splat the Newt’ with some bricks”_ He _considered_ saying this, of telling her the truth and making her feel more guilty and appalled than she already did, but he couldn’t quite bring himself to offer such bitter sarcasm and instead shook his head in a mollifying manner. Newt offered her a grim smile, the thinness of it barely stretching his lips as he replied: “It's alright, I managed to persuade him to give me the money and as dubious as it all seemed, I don’t think anything too bad will come of it.”

“Then what happened to your shoulder?” she pressed.

He went to shrug before thinking better of it and replying, “Had a bit of a fall in the park and landed on it wrong. I’m going to get it looked at later today though, so please don’t worry yourself.”

“Idiot,” she muttered before looking at him levelly, something odd shining in her green eyes that he couldn’t quite place, “You would tell me if something had happened, wouldn’t you? I don’t want you getting in trouble because of something I encouraged you to do, sweetie.”

“It's fine. I appreciate your help but you really have nothing to worry about. But…I wouldn’t hang around people like Grimmson anymore if you can manage it, Queenie. He seems like bad news,” Newt beseeched her with a strained smile and before she could argue upon the flimsy lie, he barrelled onto something he knew would distract her, “But something interesting did happen after I met with Grimmson.”

“Oh yeah? And what was that?” she asked, clearly dubious of Newt’s definition of ‘interesting’ as it often included things she considered dull such as an increase in the bird population in the park nearby or a book she considered to be on the ‘nerdier side of trendy’.

“I met someone. A…man.” He hesitated to say the word guy as he usually might have, as such a crude description seemed inadequate to describe the person in question.

“A man? Like an actual man, not just some old guy on a bus you helped with his shopping?”

Newt grimaced and shook his head with a small smile, “No, not that. A man offered me a lift home and -yes, I know it’s not generally the best idea to accept lifts from strangers - but he…was very helpful. Came at a moment where I really appreciated it…it was raining rather a lot after all.” He quickly substituted the scenario for one that would make her less angry and overprotective, “And, well, we’re meeting for coffee this evening.” 

“You mean you actually spoke to someone and it didn’t end in a quick, awkward bang or emotionally crushing disaster?”

“Not yet…no,” Newt murmured and she grinned, tapping his arm very gingerly compared to her earlier aggressive tirade.

“So…?”

“So what?”

“What’s he like? What’s his name? What does he do?”

Newt shook his head, “I’m not telling you his name because I know that you will go off on one of your ridiculous internet stalking sprees like you did last time with Tom.”

“Oh, you mean the guy you dated for like a week before I warned you about his obsession with steak houses and deer hunting? Seriously, Newt, it took just looking at his Facebook page for ten minutes to find that out and I saved you from a lot of trouble somewhere down the line when you found that stuff out your way.”

Newt pulled a face; she may be right but he still didn’t want her filling his head with random nonsense that would come off as crazy and stalkerish should he act upon it when he met up – for perfectly innocuous reasons, he might add – with a man who may well have saved his life. Didn’t seem fair somehow.

“Still, I don’t really expect this to be anything all that serious,” Newt said, not wanting to raise Queenie’s overly-invested hopes unnecessarily but then added in a quieter tone, “He offered to check my shoulder for me and as he is practically a stranger, he also offered to do it in a public place so it didn’t make me uncomfortable.”

“Check your shoulder? So what, is he a medical student or something?”

“Doctor, apparently. Or used to be anyway.”

“And you didn’t think to check whether he had any proof of that before you agreed to let him pretty much strip you topless in public?” Queenie’s blonde brows had disappeared somewhere into her blonde curls.

Newt rubbed a hand over the back of his neck and through his hair before wincing as his injured shoulder protested the movement. “I wasn’t exactly in a position to go around checking his credentials at the time.”

Queenie stepped closer, reaching up and putting a careful hand on his uninjured shoulder as he turned to go to the door, “Well, be careful, Newt, you don’t need another situation like with that teacher of yours. The way you talk about him...or rather don’t...it worried me and I don’t want you getting hurt again.”

He swallowed, blinked and nodded before donning his apron and heading out to properly start his shift. Mornings were usually quieter up until around lunchtime but there were always a few students keen to grab their reads and textbooks earlier in the day all the same. Even more so with coffee but thankfully Queenie’s colleague Billy was present today to help out on the busier shift. Newt got on with his shift as he usually might, albeit a bit slower and with the aid of more paracetamol and coffee over the course of the day but he was careful not to overdo it lest he send himself into caffeine-induced jitters or a crash later on.

He left his shift at three with a disconcertingly smug-looking goodbye from Queenie as she told him to have fun to which he rolled his eyes and hurried off to class. Jared made an appearance and plonked himself down next to Newt in his usual manner, spilling books, pens, notes and red bull over the table as he flipped it up from the side of the chair.

“How ya doing, Newt?” He popped the N in his name in a way that only Jared ever seemed capable of and Newt smirked into his notes

“Bit sore, you?”

“Just peachy.” he replied flippantly before cocking an eyebrow, “You sure you’re okay? Cause you look like hell.”

“Gee, thanks,” Newt replied, keeping his eyes on the lecture board at the front of the classroom.

“Seriously, Newt, you look worse than I did last weekend after Archie’s.”

“Jared, I’m afraid that I’m going to have to remind you that was last Wednesday. I remember quite clearly because you called me for a lift in the middle of a lecture that you were _supposed_ to be in and Professor Ainsley told me to tell you had to appear in a disciplinary attendance hearing which you then skipped as well.” 

“Oh come on, it wasn’t that bad. I just needed a hand.”

“I don’t even have a car to give you a lift with.”

Jared looked a little stumped at that one but grinned anyway and reached out to slap a hand on Newt’s shoulder which he neatly dodged by leaning forward to dig a bottle of water out of his bag. He managed to pass it off as a perfectly natural move and was thankful that the lecturer chose that moment to call upon someone in the class to answer a question – a call for perfect silence and stillness. It wasn’t even like no one in the room full of enthused students and knowledgeable individuals didn’t know the answer – just that no one wanted to face down their colleague’s rebuttals nor speak so publicly. There was a lull before Newt sighed and stuck his own hand in the air, rattling off the statistics of coastal erosion on the southern coast and suggesting ways it was affecting the wildlife as a result. There was a palpable release of tension before the teacher continued and everyone began their private conversations once more. It wasn’t that the lecture wasn’t interesting but one such as this was something Newt had covered weeks before in his own studies.

Safe once again, Jared changed the subject, “So the other half is back in town.”

Newt’s brows rose as he glanced over at his friend, “Really? I thought you said he was working in Paris?”

“He was but his work moves him about quite a bit and so he’s back in the city and we’re going out Saturday night. You interested?”

“To join you on a date with you and your absentee boyfriend? I’m alright actually, thank you very much.”

“Oh come on now, it’ll be fun.”

“You say that every time but I’m working so-”

“Queenie says otherwise, she said that you had the whole weekend off – she was complaining cause she has to put up with that Vig guy.”

“Billy? I thought she got along well with him?”

“Apparently he tried asking her out and it’s made things super awkward.”

“Oh right…still, well I’m afraid I’m busy,” he looked sideways at his friend whose clear green eyes were creased under dark blonde brows and ventured, “Are you sure there’s nothing else bothering you? No other reason why you want me to come along?” 

Jared dug the end of his pen into the blue plastic tabletop and looked across at Newt with only half of his usual smug, carefree cheer, “Things’ve been…awkward between us lately. We’re keepin in contact and all but I get the feeling that what was between us was more fuck-buddies who appreciate a good whiskey. Whenever we meet, we have a blast but he doesn’t stick around the next morning; sometimes not even that long. He’s a slave to his friggin job and I don’t think that’s ever going to change.”

Newt nodded mutely, not knowing how to voice the acknowledgement of something he had suspected for some time. One of the nice things about his friendship with Jared was that neither of them was great at talking about things like this; not in the way that people like Queenie or Theseus could. It may seem an imposition but it usually worked out as each could either tell what the other meant without unnecessary elaboration or would simply not voice issues that sought no recognition. It was simpler for the most part.

Jared sighed, rubbing a hand back through his ear-length dark blonde hair and scribbling a few notes, “Not that it much matters if I’m honest. I knew what this was when I walked into it – shouldn’t’ve expected anything else.”

The bitterness was clear but so was the resignation- the knowledge of what he couldn’t change in his relationship with someone he cared for no matter how much he might wish it.

“So what’ve you got planned for Saturday then?” Newt asked, aiming to brace on with the conversation regardless.

“Drinks, live mic night music, drinks, more drinks and then hopefully the roughest shagging this side of the Atlantic.”

Newt flushed and snorted his amusement, “Think I made the right call by missing it then.”

“You ain’t missed anything yet, buddy boy.”

Newt wasn’t sure whether that was meant to be reassuring or threatening but laughed all the same. He got the feeling that with the events of the last few days, he might well have much more to worry about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback Craved!  
> Opinions?  
> Requests?  
> Criticism?  
> All welcome!  
> Btw coffee date coming up next along with some nice little hints lol


	4. There's this noise I cannot shake

_14 th October _

Newt deliberated outside the coffee shop for nearly six minutes before he dared enter. It didn’t make him more than thirty seconds late but he still felt a little flustered as he saw that Gellert was already sat at a booth towards the back of the café. He had no drink before him and his keen, mismatched eyes were scanning a neatly folded newspaper which he sat down at the same time Newt did. The zoologist smiled as he greeted the man, a small tug of his lips that widened as Gellert extended his hand to shake Newt’s own, a polite gesture that eased Newt’s nerves a little even if the touch lasted a few moments longer than a traditional handshake usually might’ve.

“Good afternoon, Newt. I have to say, I’m glad you came.”

“Hello,” Newt blurted in response with his eyes fixed at chest level, “Thank you again for doing this.”

“It’s quite alright, it would be remiss of me to leave a...wilful young man such as yourself in need.”

Newt chuckled, “And by wilful I’m sure you mean foolishly stubborn.”

“I’m assuming that this insight is coming from a place of experience?” came the wry reply.

“Maybe,” he admitted before glancing towards the coffee bar. “What are you drinking? It’s the least I can do after all your help.”

Gellert raised a sculpted blonde eyebrow, “I was under the impression that you were in financial trouble. Though I also recall that you mentioned managing to obtain some money yesterday.”

Newt flushed slightly but nodded, “Ah, uh, yes, I made a loan to a friend to help him start a bakery a month or so ago but I then ran into a jot of rather bad luck and, well, I thought I’d left that meeting worse off than I in fact did.”

“Well, that’s a relief to hear but all the same, do not feel obliged to fulfil your imagined debt to me quite so quickly.” The doctor’s eyes looked different in the daylight – more starkly contrasted in such a drastic way that Newt couldn’t help but meet them, couldn’t look away, in fact. Was entranced by the singular way in which his vibrant lips curved into a smile, “I was rather hoping that there might be further opportunities ahead to get to know you better.”

Newt couldn’t help but return the smile then, one of his hands curling around the other on the tabletop, lashes lowering as he replied: “I suppose that how many drinks I owe you depends entirely on how much you saving my life is worth.”

Something peculiar sparked in Gellert’s eyes as he leant forward, forearms resting upon the table, “I’m not sure whether it’s quite as drastic as all that, but if I were a wagering man, I would gander that your worth would most certainly outweigh that of any hot beverage you could purchase.”

Newt huffed a laugh, “Well, do you have any better suggestions?”

“Several, though I’m sure that I could think of something more appropriate whilst we attend to the business at hand.”

“Business?” Newt blurted, completely distracted by the possible double meaning of the man’s smooth words and Gellert inclined his head politely.

“Yes, your shoulder.”

“Oh yeah, I’ll just-…I’ll get drinks first, shall I?” he hastened to stand, digging his wallet out of his pocket and eying the table before him as he edged slightly towards the coffee bar, “What would you like?”

“A Cortado, if it isn’t too much trouble.”

Newt blinked but nodded and turned, going over to the bar to make the order, getting himself a tea while he was at it, smiling to the young man serving him, whom he vaguely recognised as a fellow student. Dyed bleach blonde hair, pierced ear and big dark eyes that winked as he handed Newt his orders, his hand brushing Newt’s more than was perhaps necessary “Enjoy.”

Newt shot him a shy smile and moved hunched-shouldered back over to the table and slid into the booth. He handed the drink over to Gellert as carefully as he could but the straining muscles in his arm and shoulder decided to spasm and a little of the brimming, scalding hot liquid still spilt over his fingers. He bit back low curses, shaking the offended digits out rapidly and wrapping them in a napkin, flushing in embarrassment. Gellert did not comment, however; he merely took his drink with a nod of thanks and seemed to savour the coffee in his mouth for a few moments before he swallowed.

Newt nursed his tea, eyes fixed on the still brown surface in between sips. It was Gellert who eventually broke the silence, “So you’re a student, what is it exactly that you study?”

“Exotic animal training and management – my masters anyway,” Newt tilted his head, one hand cupping his mug whilst the other came up to push his unruly hair from his face. “My original degree was along the same lines. I took a few years out whilst I travelled but I found that it’s difficult to be taken seriously or given any opportunities unless you demonstrate some degree of academic merit.”

“What made you decide to settle in Dublin, of all places?”

Newt considered the question as he took another sip of piping hot tea, sighing as he detected slight hints of cinnamon and cloves edging it. A herbal blend it seemed; he had been rather distracted whilst ordering so couldn’t be sure but it was nice. Sweet and slightly smoky accompanying the usual tea taste. “I started my further education in London – King’s College, in fact,” he admitted before he faltered a little “I...didn’t find it a good fit and one of my other applications had been here – a backup, as it were, but I soon found that I liked it here more than I think I ever would’ve in London. I don’t like to linger too much, you see,” he laughed a little, “Somewhat like my mother in that respect.”

“She travels a great deal then?” he prompted and Newt nodded.

“Yes, always has done, though I don’t resent her for it like Theseus does – she’s doing good work for creatures in desperate need.”

“Theseus?”

“My older brother,” Newt clarified “Hard-worker, officious and very bright but not the easiest to get on with. Bit of a hugger too,” He chuckled “Though I suppose most brothers are like that, difficult, I mean, not the hugging part.”

“Sibling rivalry is common though I suspect that what you refer to is simply an abrasion of conflicting personalities,” Gellert remarked diplomatically.

“That’s one way of putting it, certainly.” Newt conceded with a slight sigh as his shoulder ached anew when he attempted to relax back into his seat. “I should probably speak to them more often than I do. I haven’t seen any of them in person since I started my masters.” He scratched a spot upon the table by his teacup with an absent fingernail “We had a…disagreement on my education and my prospects because of those choices.” The zoologist released a dry laugh “I rather doubt I would’ve ever made a very good police officer but that didn’t stop Theseus from trying.” 

Newt found himself somewhat shocked at how verbose he had become in the short space of time since they had sat down and decided that he could probably chalk it up to tiredness, stress and a need to vent some of his emotions. He wasn’t about to go blabbing about his much more pressing issues such as his finances or the blood-thirsty loan-shark likely stalking him but he supposed that talking about more trivial matters to someone might help too. He couldn’t exactly talk about his issues with his family or past with Theseus, Tina or Queenie as they were part of those problems. 

It helped, too, that Gellert was regarding him with curiosity and though he had remained silent during Newt’s pauses, he gave the distinct impression that he was both listening and interested. Likely a honed skill, Newt felt. On that thought, he asked, “You mentioned you’re a psychiatrist now? What encouraged you down that path exactly?”

Gellert made a nonchalant gesture with the hand currently occupied with the tiny china cup, “I have worked in a variety of environments and countries over my life and as such, I have come to terms with the fact that I – rather like yourself – do not tend to linger for longer than propriety or necessity dictates.” His eyes became tangibly sombre then, though without losing the stern, indefinably steady edge that held the man, “I concluded my last active years as a surgeon after I found myself responsible for the death of a patient. It was not the first time, but this one struck me quite particularly as it was linked to an attempted murder. It was a miracle the man had survived as long as he did and I felt...responsible in the extreme when he died on my operating table.”

“Oh-...I’m sorry to hear that,” Newt replied, feeling that the response was inadequate but unsure of how else to respond to such a confession.

“It’s something that I take responsibility for, and while I decided not to let it define me, I also knew that I should alter my career path,” he took a deep sip of his coffee before setting it down with a sigh. “I can still help people but the role is less…physically involved.” His head tilted as he looked at Newt through pale lashes, “I’ve always held an interest for the inner workings of the human mind, and I have found that I can do as much with people here as I accomplished in a more involved role.”

“I can understand why work like that could wear on you,” Newt said, thinking of all the times that Tina and Theseus had come close to breakdowns under the pressure of the job and their parental responsibilities. High-pressure jobs such as police-work and medical professions were rife with such pitfalls. He thought too of the many creatures he had taken into his care and those that lingered with him despite knowing that he had done his best – things didn’t always work out no matter how much he tried. “You value those under your care and whilst it's better to stay objective, it’s not always possible. Compassion isn’t always something that you can ignore simply because you know it’s what’s best for your patient.” Newt drank down the last of his tea, grimacing slightly, not at the flavour but more because the movement pulled upon his sore, slowly setting back muscles and an unpleasant crunching sound accompanied his exhalation of distress.

The doctor’s keen eyes zeroed in on the area of discomfort, trailing lightly over Newt’s green jacket with a touch of amusement before they rested on his shoulder, “I think that we should tend to your injuries. It would be remiss of me to allow you to remain in pain simply for the sake of our conversation.” He stood, picking up a leather medical bag and gesturing toward the bathroom door at the back of the shop. It was a unisex, single occupancy affair, thankfully quite clean and even had a baby changing station which Gellert gestured to as Newt sheepishly followed him in. Newt managed to lever himself awkwardly, painfully up onto the table-surface with only one arm but still faltered and almost fell forward when his back flared anew, drawing a strangled gasp from his lips as his vision greyed a little at the edges. He was braced before he could fall, however, and he muttered a quiet thanks as Gellert’s hands, firm and strong, helped him sit up on the table more securely though resisting Newt’s body’s instinct to lean back against the wall behind him, keeping the younger man upright and braced with one hand on his uninjured shoulder and the other holding Newt’s right arm around the bicep. 

“How’s the pain?” Gellert asked, moving his hand up slightly, palpating his shoulder, and Newt choked down a whimper through gritted teeth. “Have you taken anything for it?”

Newt nodded, head bowed forward as the doctor continued to feel along Newt’s arm, back and shoulder, “Paracetamol; my last dose was about three hours ag-ah!” he cut off with a barely stifled cry as Gellert’s hands reached the centre of his agony. The touch paused before it was removed and Gellert ducked down to meet Newt’s watering gaze, mismatched eyes steady and reassuring.

“I need you to take off your jacket and shirt now, Newt, so I can properly examine the injury.”

“Alright,” Newt murmured, keeping his head down as he shucked his jacket off and reached finely trembling hands up to start unbuttoning his shirt. He focussed solely upon the task in an effort to not truly acknowledge the fact that he was undressing in a public bathroom in front of a handsome man he barely knew.

Thankfully, Gellert chose to distract him as he spoke up, asking, “Do you remember how it was inflicted?”

“A brick, I think, or perhaps a rock. I couldn’t really say, was running and kind of dizzy at the time but I fell pretty hard when it hit me.”

Gellert nodded, expression grave and unreadable as Newt gingerly removed his shirt, pulling it down off his shoulders so that his upper back was exposed but not properly removing the garment. Gellert turned him slightly so that he could better see Newt’s back and shoulder, one cool hand coming up again to palpate the injured area and Newt fought not to cry out.

“I apologise, this will hurt more before it gets any better.”

“S'okay,” Newt muttered in a slight slur, blinking rapidly to try to clear them of the sheen of tears as something shifted with a crack in his shoulder when Gellert pressed upon it, “Wouldn’t be the first time I broke something.”

“Tell me.”

The quiet words begged no argument but urged him in a somewhat comforting manner that helped Newt ignore the pain as the doctor began dabbing at the grazes on his shoulder with an antiseptic wipe.

“I broke my arm and two ribs whilst in Madrid, rolled down a hill and into a wall after being kicked by a stallion I was helping tend to. He had been savaged by a dog and when I approached to help, he kicked me right through the stable door. The doctor told me I was lucky he didn’t cave in my chest. Still hurt like a bugger though.”

“I can imagine,” Gellert commented, pulling Newt’s right arm forward and drawing a low gasp from him with the move. “Nearly there,” he added before inquiring, “Would I be right in thinking that you have an affinity for animals that goes beyond a simple career choice? Perhaps in preference to humans?”

“That obvious, is it?” Newt’s hoarse laugh was edged with pain as Gellert unrolled a sheaf of clean white bandages and began wrapping them about the injured shoulder, swathing most of his upper chest, arm and back to properly secure the binding. The doctor’s bracing hand laid lightly at the base of Newt’s neck, the touch not intimate, exactly but not entirely clinical either in the way that his little finger drifted ever so slightly higher before he readjusted seamlessly. 

Gellert smiled thinly at him over Newt’s shoulder as he finished securing the bandages and tied off the ends, trimming the excess material with a crisp snip of a pair of medical scissors. “I can appreciate a natural affinity to those who are less prone to be as utterly vexing as our fellow man. There is a simplicity in the company of creatures that can keep a promise that humans fail to.” 

The implication laced into the words did not go unnoticed and Newt found his eyes narrowing as he leant slightly further away from the man stood beside him, “Are you implying that I have unresolved trust issues?”

“There are very few of us in this world that do not,” the doctor replied evenly, beginning to pack his equipment back into his bag before pausing as his eyes fell upon the gash cleaving the crook of Newt’s elbow. The zoologist followed the other’s gaze and cursed inwardly as he saw that there was dried blood crusted down his arm again and that the wound was slowly dribbling from where it had cracked open.

“Would you like me to attend to that?” the question was quiet but Newt found himself hesitating; despite currently sitting locked in a public bathroom, half-naked, it was at the point of the thin wound marring his arm that he became withdrawn. He ducked his head slightly and made to pull his shirt back up over his shoulders but was stopped by a light touch to his wrist. It wasn’t a tight grip or even a grip really, just a hand laying there in a manner that begged pause without words or force; Newt’s eyes moved up to meet the other’s once more, searching the silvery-blue and deep brown to discern a question or meaning that he couldn’t quite name. 

“That must be painful,” Gellert observed, eyes lingering on the cut in an almost mournful way and Newt inclined his head slightly, not quite a nod but an acknowledgement all the same.

“Barely noticed it actually, although Pickett certainly did.”

Gellert’s eyes drifted across Newt in a scanning, searching look, “And where is your reptilian ride-along today, may I ask?”

The light humour worked and Newt snorted slightly before proffering his cut arm over to Gellert, meeting his eyes in an oddly open moment which did not go unnoticed if the slight crinkling around the older man’s eyes was any gauge. Newt pulled his gaze back to pay attention to the doctor’s hands as they went about producing more antiseptic wipes and a length of gauze bandage.

“He’s at home today. I try to make him stay in a more suitable environment than my coat whenever I can but he’s very attached and most of the time, my body-heat seems to be enough.”

“What other animals do you have in your care?”

“How’d you know there are others?” Newt asked with an arched brow.

“Well, the feathers in your hair for one thing, and what appears to be cat hair on your clothes for another,” he replied, indicating the areas with his gaze as his hands were occupied with the clinical ministrations. Newt looked absently down at himself, seeing that he was indeed flecked and coated with the various coloured down of each furred creature he coinhabited his flat with. He saw no feathers, however, and instinctively scraped a hand self—consciously through his hair; vexed that his cursory swipes from that morning had proved futile. What must he look like to a man who didn’t seem to have so much as a hair out of place? His dark suit jacket, trousers pinstriped with threads of the deepest burgundy and a swirl-patterned waistcoat to match. Though his sleeves were rolled up to attend to Newt’s injuries, they were done so with immaculately neat creases so preserve the garments. Even his dark brogues were polished to a gleam.

Whereas Newt was finding more detritus in his hair than he had in quite some time, he eventually gave up and let his good arm drop to his side to awkwardly pick at the worn edge of the plyboard surface he sat upon, his curled copper fringe acting as a perfect shield for his embarrassed, flushing face. He thought his cheeks might have actually started radiating tangible heat when he felt nimble fingers brush through his hair, plucking a particularly fine feather from his fringe, brushing his forehead lightly as they did so. The touch was fleeting but when Newt looked up through his lashes at Gellert, he could see a small smile playing at the corners of Gellert’s lips. 

“Thanks,” he murmured, eyes fixed upon the other man’s lips in a manner most unlike himself; somehow fascinating with such a subtle expression upon them even as the man’s eyes burned bright and vibrant against the pallor of his fine-featured face. Newt found himself drifting forward, the pain in his shoulder and arm lessened, even as they both burned slightly with the sting of fresh antiseptic.

Newt almost jumped out of his skin moments later, however, when there came a loud knock at the door and an exasperated female voice called, “Come on, pants back on you two, I’m bursting out here!”

Gellert closed his medical bag with an audible snap of irritation and Newt scrambled down off the table, shucking his shirt back on and hurriedly buttoning it with a burning face. He slipped past Gellert, out of the bathroom and towards the door of the shop with his head down the entire time, ignoring the glare of the woman who entered the loo behind him with a slam of the door. The zoologist felt the scandalised stares of everyone in the shop and the smirk of the barista follow him as he left, rounding the corner and putting his back to the wall. His breathing was coming in and out rather fast but he felt surprise and a little relief when Gellert too came around the corner mere moments later, coat neatly folded over his arm and medical bag held smartly in the same arm.

“I suppose it’s not all that surprising that people might think like that,” Newt commented, eyes fixed upon the pavement in front of him, the words spilling forth, “Two men entering a public bathroom together wasn’t likely going to be seen as really very innocent.” 

“I suppose not,” came the mild reply, though when Newt ventured a nervous glance up to look at the other man, he noticed a tightness to his expression that had not been previously present and he sensed than Gellert was irritated even if he did a good job of masking it with a polite, gentlemanly exterior. Though whether it was irritation at the woman or him, Newt honestly couldn’t say. It was probably both.

“Not that it's your fault, of course, I was the one to insist upon a public place.”

“A wise precaution on your part.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Have you not been following the local news lately?”

“Oh, you mean the serial killer loose on the streets of Dublin?”

Gellert’s eyes crinkled again and he let out a chuckle, “Actually, I was referring to the recent survey of poor hygiene standards of student-frequented establishments, including coffee bars and student accommodation.” 

Newt let out a sharp laugh of his own, scrubbing a hand over the back of his neck and readjusting his bag strap before nodding and replying with a teasing tone, “Can’t argue with you there. I’m sorry if the establishments in Temple Bar aren’t sophisticated enough for your refined tastes.” He tilted his head, “Might-sight cleaner than my flat, though.”

“The flat you share with an unspecified number of shedding creatures? I’m sure,” came the dry reply, but the older man’s eyes were smiling once more and Newt let out a breath that seemed to hold all the earlier tension. “If you are truly concerned about my tastes, perhaps you might allow me to choose our next meeting place?”

“What makes you so sure that you want to see me again?” Newt asked, more out of genuine curiosity than any self-deprecation. 

“As unlikely as it may seem to you, I find myself enjoying your company thus far.”

“Thus far,” Newt echoed with a smile.

“I dislike broad declarations and unfounded assumptions,” Gellert clarified, “So for the sake of avoiding such things, I endeavour to be forthright for the most part.”

“Seems sensible,” Newt looked up and down the darkened road, orange streetlights and glaring shopfronts glimmering every few feet, the pavement interspersed by people making their way home. “If it helps, I’m rather rubbish at lying anyway, so I suppose I could say that you wouldn’t have to worry about that.” He tilted his head thoughtfully, “Though I must admit that your being a psychiatrist might render any attempts I did make rather redundant.” 

“I’ll try to restrain my professional tendencies wherever possible,” Gellert reassured him, eyes glimmering. “I find that a proficiency for psychoanalysis can have the polar effects of either unhealthily attracting or completely repelling the majority of people. Many don’t appreciate having their flaws and personalities drawn to the surface of a conversation, and others mistake such tactics as an infatuation bred of an empathetic response.”

“It sounds like a dangerous line to tread.”

“In some ways, yes,” the doctor admitted, “Though I do relish the challenge of it to a certain extent.”

“And what extent would that be?” Newt asked with a wry smile. 

“It varies from person to person, but I find my underlying passion tends towards that of the being proven capable of such finesse. Many of my pastimes revolve around the application of very deliberate and meticulously executed designs. The Culinary Arts. Music. Art. They all require a steady hand and resolve to perform to perfection.” He inclined his head slightly with a rueful smile, “Or as close to perfection as I dare to tread.”

“Do you have many friends?” Newt asked before flushing slightly and hastening to add, “I mean, because you speak as if you devote most of your time to your work and hobbies. I can’t imagine being able to work on many friendships whilst pursuing so many things.”

Gellert’s smile turned patient, almost indulgent, “I do in fact socialise quite regularly; another passion of mine happens to be entertaining. Though since moving here, I must admit that those occasions have become fewer than before.”

Newt nodded, feeling rather overwhelmed by the drastic differences between himself and the man before him. Not for the first time, he found himself wondering exactly what it was that made Gellert patient enough to both agree to help him and to actually keep up a pretence of being interested in what Newt had to say. Evidently, the man picked up on both Newt’s hesitance and doubt as he released another low laugh, “I apologise, Newt, I have spent the majority of our time together this evening speaking about myself and I suspect that you rather think me a braggart.” 

“Not at all,” Newt assured him, “I just find myself wondering why you’d subject yourself to more of my company when I haven’t really contributed anything to our conversation?”

“Would I be correct in thinking that you take your time warming up to people?” Gellert asked, seeming earnest enough, and Newt considered how long it took him to properly befriend Tina, Queenie and Jacob and nodded mutely. Gellert offered him a winning smile, “Then I shall endeavour to occupy the meantime until that happens by inviting you to dinner. You needn’t feel obliged if you truly do not wish to but I anticipate finding you an excellent addition to my table.” 

Newt’s eyes widened and he looked up to somewhere about the older man’s left ear with surprise and a little panic, “I wouldn’t want to impose upon your dinner party or guests and-”

“You would be no imposition,” Gellert cut in smoothly, raising a hand in supplication of the zoologist’s protests. “This is not a party, simply a meal to be shared between the two of us, if you are amenable?”

“I-…yes, I would like that,” Newt relented with a genuine smile that warmed his eyes and cheeks in equal amounts against the brisk night air. 

“Tomorrow night, if that is convenient?”

Newt blinked “Uh, yes, that should be fine.”

“Very well, I shall see you at seven o’clock tomorrow evening.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, is there anyone still reading this? I'm unsure but sorry for the erratic updates - work be crazy and life even more so. Hope its all alright so far and yes, I know it's a bit fluffy and slow (for me) but it will pick up eventually.


	5. There’s something at the door

_15 th October _

Newt Scamander arrived, perhaps as an attempt at courtesy for his minor blunder the previous day, ten minutes early and loitered outside Gellert’s front door for mere seconds before he dared knock. It wasn’t as if Gellert had been lingering around, awaiting Newt’s arrival like an overeager puppy, mind you, he had merely been arranging the final touches to the facade of normalcy in his hallway by placing a delicate vase of lilac Anemone, Anthurium and Queen Anne’s lace. They both provided him with a private smile of his own at the personal nature of the language of flowers and helped to mask the scents that could have lingered had Gellert not been such a fastidious cleaner. It wouldn’t do for Newt’s reptilian companion to scent something that might, in turn, unnerve its master. Gellert was never one to leave anything of import to chance.

He made sure to wait a good thirty seconds before going to open the door, politely stepping aside and gesturing for Newt to enter with a quiet greeting of: “Good evening, Newt, thank you for coming.”

Newt ducked through, clad in the same dark green jacket and battered tan shoes as the day before though thankfully, the student had shown a little effort by changing his shirt to a light blue one of a similar variety and brown corduroy trousers. The doctor had to repress an eye-roll at the lack of variety or quality the young man’s wardrobe held; he had no doubt worn what he thought was his best option. Gellert was more than aware that the student had already sold a great deal of his finer possessions to sustain himself under the massive financial strain that Gellert had artfully arranged to fall upon him. Putting pressure upon Newt’s landlord’s business by having a colleague of his in the retail sector start up a rival bookshop one street across from Worme’s. It had been a gradual process over the course of many months, but eventually, it had the desired effect so that Worme felt the need to increase the rent he was charging his tenants to support himself.

Not the mention putting the ideas into his devious little Queenie’s head – funding her business degree to fuel the christening of her fiancé’s career. A fiancé that just so happened to be a client of his – a neurotic mess of a man desperate to keep his girlfriend happy and to provide for both of them. It had been a fine weave of manipulations that wove the couple tighter and into exactly the places and decisions that led to Newt loaning his friend the money that led to his own destitution.

Truly, Gellert could not judge the young man for his shabbily dressed state when the poverty he had been entrenched in was so deliciously a part of Gellert’s own design. So, instead, he played the gracious host and politely flirtatious companion by commenting upon the jacket as he took it from the young man to hang up in the nearby cupboard.

“I’m assuming that there’s a story behind this jacket? You do seem to show it favour even if it does not do you the justice it perhaps should.”

It worked as Newt’s cheeks flushed prettily, the rosy glow spreading a little down his neck to tease the messy, hair-scattered collar of his shirt which he pulled at self-consciously as Gellert closed the cupboard door behind him.

“I wore it to my brother’s wedding a few years back and I couldn’t find it in myself to sell it. The trousers were already ruined, so I suppose I felt the need to preserve a memory of that day in whatever way I could,” he smiled, a tad fondly, staring absently at somewhere about the skirting board with reminiscent bright eyes before they were drawn inexorably up to the vase of flowers and Gellert repressed a smirk of his own. “I’m glad that he found someone like Tina after what happened with Leta.”

The name strummed that urge to smile that much stronger but Gellert kept his expression smooth and fitting to the situation as he gestured for Newt to follow him along the chestnut-floored hall through to the dining room.

“Am I to assume that there was a scandal of some kind involved here?”

Newt couldn’t shake his head fast enough and Gellert allowed the knowing smile to twitch his lips momentarily as he walked ahead of the other. “No, no, nothing like that. Leta was a…she loved him a great deal, but unfortunately, she died several years ago.”

“My condolences,” Gellert acknowledged the younger man’s grief for the childhood friend that would never return to either him or his brother, turning with a sombre expression as they entered the dining room; a room that represented the pinnacle of the property’s décor. Dark wood furnishings, elegant blue brocade wallpaper forming a feature wall against the fireplace and an extensive lacquered surface forming a storage cupboard and liquor cabinet to the opposite wall. Newt barely took in the extravagance surrounding him, eyes fixed past the feature bay window that formed the third wall, the open heavy burgundy drapes revealing the frost-trodden ground outside for merely a foot before his neatly kept garden was swallowed by the dark of the hour. 

“Would you like a drink?” Gellert offered, angling himself back towards the kitchen and Newt nodded mutely, prompting Gellert, ever the host, to make the decision for him. He had already opened a bottle of oak-aged Chardonnay earlier to let it breathe and now he poured two glasses and brought them back through. Newt was still staring out of the window, standing closer now with his hands buried in his pockets. The student turned when he entered and accepted the glass with an awkward nod-bob-smile, staring down at it with that same look frozen upon his face. Gellert picked up on it immediately, of course.

“Is there something you’d prefer?”

“Ah no, I just don’t really drink all that often,” Newt admitted and the doctor nodded, filing it away in his mental notes for future reference. He had done research upon Newt prior to this, of course, but there was only so much one could learn without direct experience. Part of the many reasons why he had met Newt when he had.

“My apologies, would you prefer juice or perhaps-”

“Water’s fine,” Newt hurried in before taking a breath and adding a tentative, “Thank you.”

His hunter-green eyes alighted upon the pitcher of water that Gellert had already set out upon the table earlier and when the older man nodded, Newt hastened to pour himself a glass. A little slipped over the edges of the glass – demonstrating an unfortunate combination of nerves and the physical infirmity of the shoulder muscles jumping around the young man’s injury. An injury that, whilst having proved itself an adequate device to grow more intimate with the youth, also irritated Gellert. He had not wished Grimmson to be quite so careless and violent in his pursuit of Newt, so much so that he had felt a trickle of sincere concern to see the damage that had been done to the young man. Of course, having tended to Newt’s injuries, he now felt confident that they should not prove of any imposition to either his own design or the individual that bore them. The grazes left were superficial and the bone-deep bruising not, in fact, the fracture that he had initially suspected. It was clear that Newt had not attempted the no doubt arduous and painful process of re-wrapping the bandages Gellert had put in place the day before after the recent shower he had taken. Gellert could smell the almost offensively strong twinge of artificial mint and tea-tree shower gel that the student had used; the brand predictably one that followed ethical animal practices and boasted natural, original sources. Gellert was well aware of Newt's activist pastimes of the past decade, and of the subsequent trouble which seemed to follow him. 

Upon that thought, Gellert gestured for Newt to sit which he did after a little hesitance, taking the seat to the right of the head of the table, to the side of Gellert’s head position; both placing him closer but also giving the lad an opportunity to look away from his conversant as he seemed want to do. Gellert was aware that coming on too strong and directly too quickly would only serve to work against him and as any hunter knew, unsettling the prey early on would make them that much more likely to bolt when the time came to make the kill. He had not planned the seduction and ensnarement of such a key piece of his game for so long merely to waste the opportunity mere days after properly meeting the man. The treasured little errant brother of Theseus Scamander – the Metropolitan police force’s golden-boy – and the link between so many different strands of Gellert’s web that it was impossible not to investigate him further. It was intriguing how involving this seemingly unimpressive individual in his own affairs could prove perfect retribution upon two of his most significant and dogged pursuers, and the notion had never occurred to either! 

It didn’t hurt that the perfect opportunity of Newt Scamander just so happened to be wrapped in a delicious package.

The soft chime of an alarm sounded from the kitchen then, alerting Gellert to the starter broth being ready to serve. He stood with a murmur of explanation to his dining companion to collect the first dish of the evening. He brought it out swiftly, relishing the look of surprise upon Newt’s face as he was served in such a fashion.

“What are we eating?” Newt asked, dipping his spoon tentatively into the thin, golden broth and Gellert followed suit, savouring the taste of vegetables, herbs and the very special seasoning that he had prepared just the night before. Refreshingly unorthodox when paired with the vegetarian-friendly accompaniments. Not that he would be admitting it to Newt, of course. Over the years, Gellert had learnt to relish the little secrets of his palates and dishes that his guests remained ignorant to. And always would, as long as Gellert remained a free man.

“Golden vegetables simmered into a broth and seasoned with thyme and rosemary.” 

Newt tried another spoonful and nodded appreciatively, “It’s delicious, thank you.”

Gellert nodded, not needing the validation but appreciating the attempt at politeness from one so unaccustomed to it. He had never understood how anyone of reasonable intelligence or any degree of self-respect could spend their time in a modern university student environment, either in a teaching role or as a student. Not that Gellert was averse to organised education -- it was merely the institutional, uncultured format that the process had taken on. What value was there in learning that was spoon-fed and offered at such a low-quality standard? Gellert had learnt far more independently than from any college or school he had attended and he was painfully aware of how lackadaisical modern students tended to be in the UK especially; preferring binge-drinking and degrees in meaningless subjects to delay actually making something of themselves by applying any talent they may have in much more meaningful ways.

He was aware, too, that many simply never held that potential or stamina in the first place. Few nowadays were worth more than the more physical aspects that lay within them; the skin and faux smiles a thin veneer for the livestock – the prey – that lurked beneath. 

Something that the young man before him undoubtedly knew a fair bit about, in theory, that was. Time to put that knowledge to the test, Gellert felt.

“You mentioned that you travelled for several years in between your studies,” he left the statement open to let the direction of the conversation fall to the Zoologist; Gellert finding himself curious which elements Newt would focus upon when given the floor, so to speak.

Newt took another mouthful of broth before answering, eyes looking in Gellert’s direction but once more, lower than the doctor would consider polite in conversation, somewhere about his shoulders.

“Yes, I originally intended to begin assisting animals internationally. I intended upon learning from existing shelters, reserves and conservation projects and perhaps beginning my own one day.”

He sipped his water, re-wetting his lips rather unnecessarily before letting out a slightly nervous laugh, “Unfortunately, all the passion in the world doesn’t get you anywhere if the owners of the establishments aren’t even willing to meet with you. They wanted people with a higher level of skill. More experience, and apparently, I didn’t make the cut for most of them. I did manage to act independently for some time, spending most of my time on the continent and then venturing out to Papua New Guinea where I helped out with the establishment of the YUS,” the Zoologist smiled a little bitterly. “But I was discouraged from staying longer by the government. I didn’t technically have the correct travel permits, you see. And I couldn’t qualify for them at the time as I couldn’t provide proof of employment...or long-term residence. 

“I moved on and got involved in the Gashaka Project next - helping the Nigeria-Cameroon Chimpanzees. They’re endangered and quite intelligent. Very affectionate once you get to know them.” Newt seemed to grow in confidence, his soup almost forgotten as he continued, “I helped establish quite a few nests - about twenty, I think - in the time I was there in some pretty densely forested areas across the Savanah.” His expression grew sombre, “They were being threatened by hunters, disease and their habitats being destroyed. And whilst there is good work going on certainly, it isn’t enough.” His green eyes dropped back to his starter momentarily, “The efforts aren’t keeping up with the escalation of the issues.”

“A common complaint in the modern world, I fear,” Gellert acknowledged with a sombre nod of his own. “All one can hope to do is mark their own path and do whatever they can for something that impassions them.”

Newt took another drink and smiled slightly over the rim of the fine crystal, “Well that’s certainly what I’m trying to do.” He placed his glass down and set about finishing the rest of his now no doubt cold starter; the broth benefitting from flavours that were complemented both by heat and cold.

“Are you ready for the main course? It should be ready shortly.”

Newt nodded and Gellert cleared away the used dishes and utensils, preparing the final touches to the next course after leaving the dirtied bowls in the sink to soak. The timing of his meal was perfect as ever and he served the two opposing dishes with grace: heart tartare, sourdough toast and a seasonal salad for himself and a mushroom tartare alternative for his guest. Newt didn’t fail to pick up on the food being served to him this time as he began to eat the second course, looking up to Gellert with curiosity. “How did you know I was a vegetarian?”

“It’s easy enough to surmise, what with your choice of subject and your predilection for creatures,” Gellert replied smoothly and Newt seemed to accept the answer readily enough; he had no way of knowing the research that Gellert had done upon his life prior to their first encounter.

“Makes sense when you say it like that,” Newt conceded before venturing tentatively, glancing about the room with unreservedly curious eyes, “How long have you lived here?”

“Since I came to the city, two years ago, though I owned this house for significantly longer. It was somewhat of an inheritance from a close friend of mine.”

“A generous friend,” Newt commented, eyes wide.

“A lonely one,” Gellert corrected quietly and whilst Newt’s curiosity shone through his sea-stained eyes, Gellert was impressed by the way that the younger man sensed the pain that resided in the answer and knew not to pursue it. Perhaps the boy’s instincts were sharper than he had previously thought. Discounting his very presence in the house alone with Gellert as he was, of course. Though that could not be entirely blamed upon poor instinct – merely a great deal of work and an impeccably well-maintained façade on Gellert’s part.

It was a few bites of dinner later that Newt dared to ask a question that had no doubt been on his mind from the moment that Gellert first started his subtle and not-so-subtle flirtations.

“Do you…live alone?”

Gellert pointedly lowered his fork and looked over at his dinner companion, eyes slightly widened and expression deliberately innocently surprised. Newt caught onto this instantly, putting down his cutlery with a slight clatter and hastening to clarify his blunder into something that he likely thought was subtler. “I mean, this is a big house for one person and you hadn’t really mentioned-” he scratched the back of his neck almost spasmodically “-anyone in your life…romantically, uh, that is. Or otherwise.”

“I understand why you might be curious,” Gellert yielded, as if he were truly taken off-guard by the question and hadn’t already pre-empted Newt’s inevitable questions or his own answers; people were delightfully predictable and easy to divert. Though sometimes even he grew weary of such predictability when it presented such little variety or interest in life - no chance of an equal. “Wealthy loners are oft portrayed as notoriously poor company in most literature, mediums and folklore.” 

“Yes, I suppose they are,” Newt tilted his head slightly, dipping his fork back into his dinner though not bringing it to his lips yet as they curved upwards in a shy, slightly self-deprecating smile. “Though I’ve never much been one for paying attention to commonly held opinions or assumptions.” He quirked one fair-copper eyebrow as he looked more directly to Gellert, “However are we meant to improve or develop as a society or as individuals if we pay attention solely to the views and expectations set by outdated traditions?”

Gellert raised an eyebrow even as he consumed his next bite, swallowing before answering, “You doubt the wisdom of our forefathers simply due to the age of the ideas at play? Just because a thought is not original does not mean that it is any less apt. There are certain levels of value in tried and tested methods that border the value of instinct itself. Instincts are there for a reason and are not to be ignored on mere whim.”

“You might be right,” Newt admitted with a seemingly knowing smile and Gellert cocked his brow further in question to which Newt rose quite wonderfully, “For instance, my instincts are currently telling me that you’re avoiding my question for the same reason that you refuted me earlier.” He tilted his head as he took another bite, “Though perhaps not in so many words.”

Gellert smiled a genuine smile then, not quite as calculated as his previous expressions.

“True enough.”

“Is there a particular reason you’re avoiding it? Perhaps because the stereotype is proving more perpetuated here than would likely make me comfortable?”

“Not at all, I merely hoped to postpone such talk until a more suitable occasion arose later down the line as it were,” Gellert took another bite and put down his fork neatly to the side of his now empty plate, “I was in a decidedly involved relationship for an extended period in my life but it ended on...poor terms, to say the least.”

Newt swallowed, his wrist rotating reflexively, fingers flexing nervously around the wrought silver utensil he held. “How poor are we talking?”

“The kind that warrants little discussion with this level of intimacy and sobriety.”

Newt ducked his head with a slipping, bitter smile toying at his full lips, “I can understand that.”

“A tale to tell of your own on that front, I’d wager?”

Newt didn’t look up, “Not just yet.”

Gellert inclined his head in acknowledgement of the other’s wish for silence upon the matter – paying the student the same courtesy he had earlier offered. Instead, changing the subject once more, “You mistook me for a friend of yours when I called you before, Queenie, if I recall correctly. From your tone at the time, I would imagine that she worries a great deal for you.”

“Oh, yes, I suppose she does,” Newt acknowledged. “It’s rarely reasonable but this happens to probably be one of the few occasions when it actually was warranted.”

“Did you tell her of your injuries?”

Newt shook his head, “No, she’d only blame herself. She was the one who encouraged me to meet with the man you found me running from, and while I don’t really blame her for any of it, she would take it pretty hard.”

“Desperate circumstances affect us all differently and I can understand why you might wish to spare your friend from such culpability,” Gellert said before fixing the Zoologist with a pointed look as he saw the slight wince that escaped him when his unbound shoulder no doubt twinged with pain once more. “However, in this instance, I might advise you to err on the side of caution by letting someone you can rely upon know of your…vulnerable state. Both in terms of your finances and the danger you have undoubtedly found yourself in by going to such an unsavoury individual.” He leant forward in a perfect parody of earnest concern, “Do you have such an acquaintance? A friend, teacher or family member perhaps?” He feigned remembrance as he added, “You mentioned that your brother works in the police? Would he perhaps be able to aid you?”

Newt was shaking his head before Gellert had even finished speaking and let out a dry laugh, eyes painfully wide with what seemed to be real apprehension and barely repressed anxiety, “I don’t think getting Thee involved would end up helping anything. He’d overreact, pull me out of university and get me locked up in some miserable safe house somewhere until he could get everything sorted. Probably working himself into the ground to do so.” He shook his head again, eyes fixed upon his empty plate, “No, I couldn’t put Tina or Eddie through that. And besides, I really don’t think that anything too awful will come of it.”

His eyes were shining brighter now, clearly trying to convince himself with the words that had no doubt not been spoken aloud or really considered until Gellert drew them out of him at this moment. The boy practically reeking of one who would push the issues off to one side until he was forced to deal with the danger directly. “I can earn back enough of the money quickly to keep Grimmson happy and then once Jacob starts earning, he can repay me the rest of it,” he nodded, almost to himself, “It’ll be fine.” He repeated the next words so quietly that even Gellert’s keen sense of hearing barely caught the mutter, “It’ll be fine.” 

“Please do not think it presumptuous or forward of me to suggest this, but if you find yourself in need again, do not make the mistake that thinking my door is closed to you,” he made sure to keep his gaze level and tone earnest as he might with a patient, though he also tried to inject a little vulnerability into the suggestion, as if he were worried that Newt might take it the wrong way or refuse him. That inflexion had the desired effect as Newt quickly volunteered reassurances that fell flat in the way they had been intended but assured Gellert that he was playing his part right thus far.

“I-...I don’t think it presumptuous of you – kind and very generous, certainly, but I also don’t think it’s entirely necessary.” He dug his fork into the last remaining helping of food upon his plate, teeth gnawing agitatedly at his bottom lip as he did so, “I appreciate that you seem to have an...exaggerated sense of what you owe people to fulfil your Hippocratic oath but I assure you that bailing out and opening your door to broke post-grad students with too many debts isn’t part of it.”

Gellert cocked an eyebrow somewhat challengingly, “Are you under the impression that I do this sort of thing for just anyone? I assure you, Newt, that this is just as irregular for myself as it is for you.” He let a little dash of bashfulness colour his tone and lower his lashes a fraction as he added, “I admit that what may have started off as a duty-bound concern has developed into a rather more personal interest. If you don’t mind me saying.”

“N-not at all,” Newt mumbled, cheeks flaring slightly even as he managed to keep his gaze as high as Gellert’s clavicle this time around rather than boring into the floor or table once more.

“Well, that’s good to hear,” Gellert said with a smile that had the desired effect too as the Zoologist shivered very slightly but his smile remained, honest and embarrassed though it was. “Can I inquire as to whether it was mere politeness that had your agreeance to this?”

Newt blinked, nonplussed before he answered with apparent honesty, “A little, perhaps, but I also…I wanted to get to know you better. Just the same as you said.”

“Is there anything in particular that makes you curious?”

Newt laughed, “Most everything, I would say. You can’t be oblivious to the fact that you pose quite the enigma.”

“It has been said, though if one were to ask the right questions, I am quite the open book.”

Newt eyes crinkled slightly about the edges, “And I’m guessing that asking what those questions were would not be one in itself.”

Bemused, Gellert chuckled, “Quite right.”

Newt deliberated as he finished his meal, waiting almost long enough for Gellert to feel the need to change the subject before he asked, “Where did you learn to cook so well?”

And Gellert smiled; now _that_ was a question that was liable to edge Newt being at the table in future rather than upon it.

* * *

Newt found that the rest of the evening passed in a much quicker fashion after he cast aside his overt nervousness and merely asked the questions that were burning within him. With each question and its equally honest seeming answer, he felt as if a little of the tension between them were being loosened and released, allowing an easier flow that took them through dessert – a mouth-wateringly flaky and sweet raspberry and white chocolate pastry that melted upon his tongue – and into drinks shared by the fireplace in Gellert’s study. Newt had relented at the man’s insistence that he try the apparently expertly blended whiskey and whilst he choked a little upon the first sip, Newt found himself easing further into the warm, ticklish burn that lined his mouth and insides with the completion of the drink.

He discovered that Gellert had led even more of an intriguing and cultured life than he had previously suspected; having learnt to cook as a complement to his anatomical knowledge as he knew how to identify and prepare the ideal cuts of any meal. Applying precision to an art that then led to a passion. Whilst Newt did not agree with the practice of slaughtering or the consumption of animals, he could not help but admire the efforts that the doctor had gone to learn a variety of dishes and styles of cuisine. Not only that, but the student also discovered that Gellert had in fact sketched each and every design that resided in the study, none hung, Gellert said, as he did not relish the process of egocentric boasts but Newt had found the pencil drawings upon his desk, nonetheless. He didn’t quite believe the claim that Gellert had no ego as his whole home and everything about the well-presented gentleman implied otherwise, but at the same time, he did not feel that it was an unfounded narcissism and merely an acknowledgement of his own achievements. There was a fine line between the two and Gellert seemed to have learnt to tread it. 

Newt even found the courage to mention his own artwork, different and likely inferior as it was; steering more towards landscapes, nature and creatures rather than the abstract, recreations of classical art and architectural designs such as Gellert created. But he found that the subject led them into discussions that made him feel as though there was less of a definable gap between him and the older man, less like Newt was out of his depth. Newt was ignorant of some elements such as artistic style, colour and the themes therein, but he knew enough to question the terminology of what he didn’t and soon found that he was recognising elements within the art Gellert showed him – both his own and others’ – that he would usually have kept quiet upon and feigned ignorance lest he embarrass himself.

It came as a surprise when the ornate grandfather clock upon the wall chimed midnight but when it did, Newt’s head jerked up in a way it hadn’t upon the previous four chimes, for the first time realising just how long they had been talking. He decided to blame the whiskey and placed the single empty glass down upon a nearby table, wincing a little as Gellert smoothly stepped in to place a coaster underneath it with a blank expression upon his pale, sharp-featured face.

“Sorry,” Newt mumbled, slightly wrong-footed both by the turn the night had taken and by just how close Gellert was currently standing to him beside the desk, the older man not having stepped back as Newt might’ve expected him to.

“I would hate to leave you out of sorts for your lessons tomorrow,” Gellert spoke in a quiet tone and Newt blinked before realising that the man likely wasn’t implying the lewd things that Newt’s brain was insinuating.

“No, I...I don’t have any lectures, though I do have work in the afternoon.”

“What work have you found in the city? Something complimentary to your zoological talents, I would assume?”

Newt flushed slightly and shook his head “No, unfortunately not, just a job in a coffee shop, well technically it’s a bookshop too but it honestly doesn’t too all too well on that front either.” 

“I see,” Gellert acknowledged quietly before fixing Newt with an odd look that prompted the younger man to look back into those odd, captivatingly contrasting eyes.

“What is it?”

“To what are you referring?”

“That look,” Newt pushed, the warmth in his gut fuelling a touch more brazenness than he usually might’ve attempted. “You want to say something but you’re worried that it will upset me somehow.”

Gellert’s lips twitched at the edges in the direction of a begrudging smile, “Not upset, precisely, merely be denied or misconstrued.”

“Well say it and I’ll decide for myself how to construe it – mis or otherwise,” Newt said with a smile that grew in confidence as he saw through his lowered lashes and ducked head how the other man’s eyes softened a touch, the darker eye melting a little in the firefight as the silver-blue glowed bright.

“I was going to offer you an opportunity of employment, should you want it. One that perhaps might better fund your solitary stance against a bloodthirsty loan-shark and allow you a better-" his eyes scanned over Newt’s form in a way that sent a pleasant tingle down the zoologist’s spine and simmering through his battered body even as it proved as borderline exasperated as his tone, “-raiment, than the one you currently find yourself in.”

“Are you offering me a job because you don’t like my clothes?” Newt asked incredulously.

“Amongst other reasons,” Gellert admitted, “Least of which being that I believe that you need help, Newt, and that you would run yourself into the ground avoiding asking help from your family or friends. As much as you fear they would do for you.”

Newt inclined his head, examining the wood grain of the table beside him in preference to the other man’s searching, intense gaze.

“Am I wrong?”

“Maybe not, but what makes you think that I would accept help from a near-stranger over my own family and friends? No matter how charming that stranger may be,” Newt regarded Gellert’s expression through half-lidded eyes, watching as the man’s lips tightened slightly and his eyes narrowed a fraction.

“Charming, am I”

“You are and you know it,” Newt muttered and Gellert looked to be repressing a smirk. “But that wasn’t my point.”

“No, my apologies,” Gellert rested a hand upon the table, long pale fingers drumming lightly upon its surface just under Newt’s boring gaze until the younger man relented and looked up into Gellert’s earnest eyes. “I surmised that as our dynamic was initiated by my assisting you, then it might come as an easier thing to accept the help that you so clearly need from me rather than from someone you valued the opinion of such as your brother or friends.”

Newt felt his cheeks heating once more as he blurted out, “What makes you think that I don’t care about your opinion?”

Gellert’s brows rose in clear surprise, “Well, you seemed to ease yourself into my company quite admirably this evening, I thought that it might perhaps be because you were aware that you had nothing to prove to me.”

Newt blinked, “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Gellert deadpanned, smiling in a fond and patient manner. “You’re not quite as awkward as you seem to think you are, Newt. You are a bright, passionate, talented and quick-witted young man, and I believe that should you be given the right opportunities in life such as you have been previously denied, you will do well.”

Newt’s brain seemed to short-circuit for several moments as his cheeks fired, eyes wide, “I…I’m flattered that you got that impression but with all due respect, I’m not sure if you should continue psychiatric work if you think that I’m not awkward.”

Gellert chuckled quietly, “Perhaps you’re right, but I happen to believe that you present an intriguing perspective as well as an ideal study for more complex personalities that might just help me improve in my field.”

“You want to use me as a study subject?” Newt exclaimed, letting out a harsh laugh, “I wasn’t aware that I was quite that crazy.”

“Not crazy, Newt,” Gellert corrected with a wry smile, reaching forward and placing a warm hand firmly against Newt’s arm in a reassuring, bracing manner. “Never that. I was merely attempting to reassure you that you are as intriguing an individual as you seem to think I am.”

Newt released another hoarse chuckle, eyes fixed upon the other man’s arm where it came into contact with his own, the pale skin complimented the light shade of Newt’s favourite shirt even as the dark sleeve that encompassed Gellert’s arm dipped into the shadows of the firelit room.

“I’m not sure if you are a good judge of crazy.”

“Psychiatrist.” Gellert countered simply, and it was then that Newt noticed the other man had somehow drifted closer to him without him entirely realising it. The doctor’s arm no longer had to stretch out to touch him, his hand resting loosely at the crook of Newt’s elbow as Gellert’s forearm brushed along his. It was a simple contact but somehow, Newt now couldn’t stop noticing it, the warmth and strength that resided in that simple grip lifting Newt’s gaze up to meet the other’s.

“Did you just invite me for dinner to ask me to be a lab rat?”

Gellert dipped and then shook his head, face drifting closer “No.”

“Then why?” Newt swallowed with a nervous smile, “Because it rather seems to me that you cooking me a delicious meal tips the scales back in your favour. It’s not like I don’t owe you enough already.”

“What if we were to put aside the notions of obligation for now and simply enjoy each other’s company?” Gellert suggested and Newt found himself licking his lips as the nerves flooded through him, thrumming his senses into overdrive and every breath shared in the small space between the two mingling, the whiskey in both and traces of the other man’s natural scent blending seamlessly. 

“I’d like that,” Newt breathed, unsure why his voice seemed to have suddenly lost all strength nor why he couldn’t stop thinking about anything other than that spicy, clean scent that he’d first smelt in Gellert’s car and now could feel suffusing the air like so much woodsmoke. Comforting, delicious and slightly worrying all at once. Like the contradictory safety, beauty and danger of a campfire near damp cedar. The wood sparking and crackling, spitting off sparks that caught against him and left his senses alight. Newt was drawn to it like a moth to a flame, his lids lowering of their own accord as he drifted ever closer.

It was almost painful when Gellert stepped swiftly away but Newt also found himself drawing in a sigh of relief in the same moment.

“I believe that it would be wise for you to go home now, Newt.” Gellert’s eyes were alight with something akin to understanding, maybe a hint of reluctance and it only left Newt all the more baffled.

“Oh,” the sound escaped Newt before he could stop it and he quickly rushed to cover it by nodding and stepping back toward the door so as to cover his face as it flushed to his smarting ears. “Of course, I wouldn’t want to outstay my welcome or scandalise your neighbours.”

“I don’t, in fact, have any to speak of, the building to the left is vacant and the right is a chapel which is also currently unoccupied.”

“Right,” Newt muttered, finding himself irrationally annoyed and not quite able to put his finger on just where the feeling was coming from. What exactly had he expected to happen? “I guess this is goodnight then...Thank you for having me.” The words were pulled him out of polite habit drilled into him as a child from whenever he visited Leta and her parents had him over to stay. _They_ had never had any qualms over letting Newt know when he had outstayed his welcome and had rarely been as polite as Gellert was attempting to be about it. He could feel Gellert’s eyes boring into the back of his skull and wished he could stop the flush that had now spread unhelpfully to the back of his neck, visible and glaringly obvious.

The Zoologist made his way into the hall, pausing and collecting himself just enough to ask the question that his body dictated, turning but not even really looking at the other man, “Could I please use your bathroom?”

“Of course,” Gellert replied, ever the smooth and perfect host, indicating the door to the far left of the hallway and stepping neatly aside for Newt to pass him, an inscrutable and blank expression upon his unhelpfully handsome face.

“Thank you,” Newt mumbled and took refuge in the toilet mere moments later, locking the door behind him and leaning rather heavily against the marble sink. His back and shoulders flared and ached with the movement but he instead focussed simply upon the task of breathing more steadily and mentally shaking himself into sense once more. He did end up using the facilities and when he washed his hands with the citrus-scented soap, he scrubbed his cool hands over his burning face, cupping them there for several long moments before he dared pat his face dry and unbolt the toilet door.

To his surprise, Gellert was waiting for him by the front door, Newt’s coat draped over his arm and expression bordering apologetic. Unsure, Newt approached the other man, silently accepting his coat and reflexively accepting the second object that was handed to him with a taken aback blink. He looked down at the warm looking scarf, feeling the soft wool under his fingers and eyes tracing the yellow stripes that blocked the black fabric. It reminded him of the one he had back at his flat only of better quality. He looked up in surprise and asked, “You got this for me?”

“I recall you wearing it’s like on the night we met but it didn’t seem to be of good enough quality to keep out the weather.”

Newt nodded mutely, remembering that he had in fact been wearing it on the night he met Grimmson and Gellert.

“Thank you," Newt mumbled, eyes focussing upon the soft material in his hand in favour of the gaze burning the top of his ducked head. “That’s very kind of you...”

“Think nothing of it,” Gellert said smoothly even as Newt shook his head.

“But I can’t accept this.” Newt held out the scarf with his lips set in a firm line, “There’s no reason to increase any debt that may or may not be acknowledged between us. I don’t think that gifts, no matter how thoughtful, are...a good idea.”

He tried to move past Gellert then, pressing the scarf back towards the older man but was caught by the wrist as he did so. Newt turned with the movement, startled, and found Gellert tantalisingly close once more, their faces inches apart as something close to irritation flashed in those mismatched, eerie-odd eyes. Newt was about to take the initiative then, to dive in and steal one kiss from those sweet looking lips, but it was once again Gellert who not only diffused the situation but also gave Newt just the smallest thrill of hope. Gellert stepped back, pulling up the wrist he had snagged and swiftly placing a soft kiss upon Newt’s scratched knuckles, and, as they parted, he laid the scarf around Newt’s neck, tucking it in around the Zoologist’s trembling shoulders with a stern smile. “Do not put this to waste by refusing me. I have no use for such a thing and I would consider it more of an imposition to have you reject a gift than accept it.”

“But-" Newt began and Gellert merely raised a hand, silencing him without words as the older man opened the door, letting the cold night air leach into the hallway and also serve to work a little of the flush from Newt’s cheeks. Newt took the hint and stepped out onto the porch, turning to face Gellert as the man looked up and down the street with a searching gaze before he sighed.

“It would be remiss of me to not offer you a lift home.” He stated, turning back to the hallway cloakroom before Newt’s refute halted the action.

“No, it's fine, I can get the bus from the stop just ways down.” He quirked a quick smile even as he continued moving “Thanks for dinner.”

Newt didn’t wait for a reply, something odd tingling within him as he felt the other man’s gaze follow him down the street as he walked, briskly striding against the wind and cold. He didn’t know why he refused the man’s offer; it would have probably been easier than trying to hunt down a bus on the late-night schedule in an area unfamiliar to him but for some reason, the thought of being in a small, enclosed space with Gellert and then being let down from his own unrealistic expectations stung more than the winter air. 


	6. The Wind has picked us up now

_15 th – 16th October_

Newt made it home without mishap, it was more the thing that was waiting for him at the other end that proved to complicate matters. He had managed to catch the last bus of the night and walked the rest of the way, his head fogged with a cornucopia of swirling thoughts and emotions that he felt too tired to be dealing with that night. The Zoologist unlocked the front door to the house in which his flat was contained and descended the stairs, only to freeze as he saw the door to his flat was slightly ajar. Now this wasn’t particularly unusual, mind you, as the stiff wood often stuck or didn’t quite close properly enough so that the persistent scratching of one of his animal flatmates might leave it open, but what with the thoughts of Grimmson and his goons potentially being on the prowl…it set Newt’s nerves on edge even further and he approached the door with caution. 

However, almost as soon as he opened the door and caught a strong whiff of the scent of booze, cigarette smoke and heard the contented purring of several feline voices, he relaxed and smiled, albeit very tiredly. “Jared, I thought I told you to give me my key back after the last time you stayed here.”

“Don’t remember that being said.” Came the hazy voice from Newt’s bed, the languid form of his slouched upon the comforter with an arm draped over his face, the other hand scratching the back of a purring Helga as Monty lay upon the inebriate man’s chest.

“Probably because you covered your ears and said ‘lalalala’ until I gave up and let you leave,” Newt muttered, closing the door behind himself with a decisive shove, retrieving the key in question from where it had been dropped carelessly on the floor between the door and bed.

“That may well be little buddy, but here we are and ain’t you glad I did?”

Newt put one hand on his hip as he stared down at the drunk lying spread-eagled on his bed and released the tension in him with a long sigh “I actually am.” He flopped down onto the bed face-first into the pillow, still fully dressed and unwilling to change that even as the scarf around his neck released a puff of scent that only reminded him anew of the strangeness and borderline disappointment of the night. “Tonight was…strange, to say the least.”

“You too?” Jared asked, not moving apart from the repeated movement on his fussing fingers over the cat’s tummy. Newt nodded blearily into the pillow and managed to coax Lila over from where the fox had been hiding under his bed, the small creature burrowing under his arm and promptly began chewing upon the scarf. He sighed again, levering himself up, stiffly and painfully, just enough so that he could shrug off his coat and carefully extricate the new scarf away from the nibbling fangs. He threw the garments over to land upon the nearby sofa and curled back around his pillow as he turned his head to face the man sprawled across the bottom side of his bed, Jared taking up most of the space in the three-quarter but neither really caring.

“Where were you?” Jared asked quietly

“Out,” Newt replied shortly

“With?”

“I’m not entirely sure,” Newt admitted, acknowledging aloud that fact that he wasn’t really at all sure how to define whatever association existed between him and Gellert.

Jared lifted his arm even as his head remained flopped on the bed, turning slightly to regard Newt with confused green eyes “Everything okay?”

“I think so,” Newt said, letting his eyes slip closed “What brought you here so late?”

“Got stood up,” Jared replied flippantly, tonelessly, though with traces of something that was too tired and pissed to be disappointment. “Should’ve expected it by now. Can’t ever get him for two nights straight. That’d break his pattern and Sweet Jesus forbid he suddenly gives a shit about anything other than his fucking job.”

“You saw him last night, though?” Newt asked, trying to get his inebriate friend to focus on something a little more positive and he smiled softly as Jared did too.

“Yeah, yeah, it was fun. Went just how I hoped it would – he even managed to stick around til the next morning. But when I texted him tonight asking why the fuck he was an hour and a half late, he didn’t answer until about an hour after I left the bar, calling me to say that he wasn’t coming.”

“What did you say?”

“I told him that he wouldn’t be either if I had anything to do with it.”

Newt took a few seconds to get it and then blinked quite rapidly, releasing a scandalised laugh as he nudged his foot lightly into Jared’s side. “Sounds about right.” He tilted his head “So why did you come here?”

“I dunno,” Jared admitted, “I drank til I couldn’t see straight and ended up here.” He blinked rather slowly over at Newt “Sorry if I screwed up your night or anything.”

Newt laughed quietly “Don’t worry, I think I already did that myself.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yep,” Newt rubbed a hand over his eyes as the other loosened his collar “I did what I always do, I got the wrong signals and annoyed him - made everything…awkward.”

“Newt, do you remember that time you were _super_ awkward with me and I came _this_ close to smacking you upside the head?”

Newt’s brain went into overdrive for several moments before he gave up, “You’ll have to be more specific.”

“Exactly,” Jared replied with a tired smirk “If whoever this mystery moron is is worth sticking round for then he won’t take a hike for you being a fricking idiot every now and then. He’ll like it.” He shrugged and grinned as his voice slipped into an amusingly accurate imitation of Queenie even with Jared’s usually smoke-hazed Texan drawl jumbling it “Otherwise, he ain’t worth it, sweetie.” 

“I feel like this may be rich advice coming from the sozzled bloke currently lying on my bed after having been stood up,” Newt murmured, no venom in his voice and chuckled as Jared sent a playful elbow into Newt’s thigh, flopping himself close enough to snag a pillow and tug it over to his stolen section of the bed.

“I dunno, I still ended up in bed with a gorgeous moron even if you’re a bit ginger and twinky for my tastes.”

Newt grinned and shook his head faux-despairingly “And won’t we both lament having to live with that fact.”

The pair laughed for some time before Jared rolled over, pulling his weathered brown leather jacket tighter about himself and burrowing deeper into the stolen pillow. “Night, you eternally-twinky bastard.”

Newt closed his eyes for the final time that night with some relief “G’night.”

When he awoke the next morning, Newt was somewhat unsurprised that they had somehow drifted together in the night, not spooning exactly but they were definitely sleeping closer than when he had fallen asleep. This was far from the first time it had happened, they had both crashed at each other’s places before for various reasons over the years so this wasn’t exactly out of the ordinary but Newt was feeling so out of sorts from recent events that he found himself rolling out of bed much more quickly than he usually might’ve. Also, it happened, much quicker than his aching body was comfortable with and he had to choke down noises of pain as he creaked and cracked his way over the shower. 

He spent nearly fifteen minutes simply standing under the hot spray before he heard the tell-tale rattle in the pipes that told him he had precisely a minute to wash his hair properly before he was engulfed in a stream of burning then icy water. He managed to make it out without that familiar faux-pas and without slipping over and braining himself, shaking the cat hair from his towel and drying off quickly, wrapping the towel around his waist before he padded out barefoot into his room in search of clean clothes. 

He needn’t fear Jared waking before midday so took his time pulling out clothes and dressing, ignoring the snoring man spread out across his bed. His back and shoulders still ached and flared with a fierce fury but he chugged down a few more paracetamol with a pint of water before settling into the routine of tea and toast, making sure to prepare enough for two for whenever Jared awoke with a no doubt nasty hangover.

It was with a loud groan, nearly an hour later, that Newt’s impromptu roommate finally arose, flailing slightly at first before falling unceremoniously off of the bed when he clearly forgot where he was and why. It was as Newt was halfway through a sip of tea some minutes later than it all obviously came rushing back to Jared as he muttered “shit" from where he was sprawled on the floor out of sight and Newt watched with pity traced with a little amusement as Jared's arm appeared over the edge of the bed and he clambered back up onto it with an expression twisted with nausea and discomfort.

“How’re you feeling?” Newt asked in a mercifully quiet voice and Jared grimaced as he rubbed a hand over his face and through his mussed blonde hair.

“Sure, sure, I’m just dandy,” Jared groaned “Except the steel drum pounding in my skull.”

“Tea?” Newt offered, indicating over to the pot he'd made for his fellow student with one amused eyebrow. Newt offered, indicating over to the special herbal pot he'd made for his fellow student with one amused eyebrow.

“Sure, why not.”

“It’s right over here in the pot if you want it,” Newt told him with a teasing smile and Jared groaned yet again as he lumbered to his feet and over to the table where he collapsed into the chair opposite Newt. “There you go.”

“Shut it, Scamander.” The American moaned as he poured out a generous amount of the soothing blend into Newt’s favourite mug, one that was chipped, yellow and stupidly huge, patterned with black badgers. Newt merely snorted and went back to his third cup of tea, savouring it as the caffeine slipped into his system and the ache of his injuries eased along with the effects of the paracetamol.

He flinched, however, as his phone sounded with a ringtone that he had not heard in quite some time. He froze, looking about the room in utter panic, gaze zeroing in on where his phone poked halfway visible out of his abandoned corduroys on the floor by his bed. Newt didn’t move an inch, merely staring wide-eyed like a deer in headlights as the device continued to play the upbeat, classical piece that he’d long-since forgotten the name of even if he hadn’t forgotten the chords themselves.

“Who the _hell_ is calling you this early?” Jared bit out and were Newt not in such an acute state of shock, he might’ve corrected his friend that it was, in fact, five past eleven in the morning but as it was, he merely placed his tea mug down with a slightly trembling hand.

Unfortunately, Jared was not one to be put off by such reluctance when he was this hungover. He got to his feet and stalked over to scoop up Newt’s phone, glaring at the screen until it came into focus for him and he asked: “Who’s AD?”

Newt didn’t answer, merely kept his lips pursed tightly shut as the phone continued to ring. Jared’s brows rose in apparent comprehension as he made an exaggerated ‘oh’ sound “So this is mystery man from last night, eh? Worried bout what to say to him? Well, no worries, let me do the honours.”

Newt was up on his feet and trying to snatch the phone away from Jared quicker than he could think but being light of build and riddled with aches, he wasn’t fast enough to stop his fellow student from dancing away from him as he answered the call with a confident tap of his thumb upon the screen. “Newt’s phone, who dis?”

“No! Give it back!” Newt hissed, eyes flashing furiously as he tried to wrestle his phone from his friend who was keeping him at legs length with one insistent foot. “Hang up now! I’m serious.”

Jared was ignoring him though, focussing upon the oh-so-familiarly soothing tones on the other end of the line “No, no, he’s here, I’ll pass you right over.”

The bottom dropped out of Newt’s stomach and he paled considerably as the phone was pressed into his hand with a reassuring smirk from the other man. He took it numbly and held to phone to his ear as if it might bite him. “Hullo?”

“Newt?”

The voice was too much; hearing it after so long, no, he just couldn’t do it. Newt hung up and stuffed his phone into his pocket, glaring up at Jared with a furious gaze. “You had no right to do that.”

“Oh, come on, Newt, you gotta talk to the guy or this ain’t going anywhere!”

“ _That wasn’t him_!” Newt found himself yelling, the ball of stress within him feeling like it was lodged in his throat and was choking him. Jared looked thoroughly taken aback and his green eyes flashed with understanding, worry and a degree of apology that left the usually confident and verbose individual cringing slightly as he pressed his hand to his no-doubt pounding head. 

“Oh shit. Shit, Newt, I’m sorry.”

Newt didn’t say anything, just paced back over to the table and flopped himself down into the kitchen chair, leaning upon the table with his head in his hands.

“I mean it, buddy, I wouldn’t’ve done that if I’d known.”

“It's fine,” Newt sighed, scrubbing a hand over his eyes furiously “I didn’t tell you about it for a reason and it's not like I expected him to call either. It’s been years, after all.”

“Why’d you reckon he called?” Jared asked, coming to stand by the table and scrutinizing the Zoologist with searching eyes.

Newt looked up at him through the half-veil of his fingers with some tired level of resentment still colouring his tone as he pointed out “You talked to him for longer than I did.”

“Point,” Jared admitted, “Though you did choose to hang up on him the moment you got on the line.”

“Point,” Newt sighed, burying his face back in his hand and taking a sip of cooling tea with the other “So?”

“Well, he asked to speak to you. Seemed like it was pretty important.”

“Are you just saying that so that I’ll call him back?” Newt half-groaned and Jared shot him a knowing, challenging look.

“You won’t know unless you talk to him.”

“Jared…”

“Come on, it’s been years, like you said, and he’s trying to reach out to you. What harm can one call do?”

So much. So very, very much. Newt wanted to reply but instead, he merely shook his head, digging the phone out of his pocket once more and glaring at the recent contacts page, taking a few moments to stare into the glowing pixels before he looked up at Jared and relented “I’m not calling him-” he carried on before Jared could interrupt him “But if he calls back, I’ll answer.” He rubbed his thumb over his phone’s battered black plastic case “If it’s really that important, he’ll call.”

“Fine, Newt, it's up to you.”

“I know it is.”

Jared looked a little longingly toward the shower then and Newt smiled tiredly “Go on, I’m not kicking you out just quite yet.”

“Cheers mate.” He said in an affected English accent, starting toward the bathroom then pausing and looking back to Newt with a nervous grin “You’re the best, you know that?”

“Go have a shower and wake yourself up, you daft sod,” Newt told him and waited pointedly, holding in his laughter until nearly a minute later when he heard a muffled scream, loud cursing and a final thump as Jared encountered the challenging personality of Newt’s shower.

“Okay, that’s fair!” Jared yelled from the floor of the shower and Newt snorted as he heard the tell-tale sounds of skin on tiles as the felled man clambered his way back up to his feet. “We even?”

Newt considered it “I’ll call it about half-way even.”

“What if I bought you a drink tonight? That settle it?” He called, Newt humming slightly as he set about tidying his flat and feeding the various disgruntled animals who were somewhat irritated and vexed by the other human’s presence in their home. Spending extra time fussing over Pickett as the lizard’s needy streak shone through in light of Newt’s recent solo excursions.

“You know what, forget I said anything, actually. You’re off the hook.”

“It’ll be just one drink, I promise and then you can come back to your flat and continue being the mad old cat lady I know you’re about ten years and one bad phone call away from.”

“Very funny,” Newt called back before he sighed and relented “Alright, one drink and then I’m out of there.” He checked the time “Look, I’ve got to get to work but I’ll see you later, alright?” Just as he was about to head out of the door, bag and coat in hand, he saw the pleading eyes of Pickett looking up at him from his terrarium and pocketed the needy creature with a last shouted warning to Jared “And don’t touch Lila, she can and will take your eye out.”

“Duly noted!” Jared replied, sticking his head out of the bathroom door just as Newt shut the door behind himself. 

The rest of the day passes in a painfully dull and predictable manner, work was normal, the journey to and from was normal; it was all so jarringly _normal_ to follow the trend of the last few days. During the low hours in the shop, however, he finally had suitable opportunity to consider the events of the night before and, in all honesty, and with due consideration, Newt realised that it hadn’t gone quite as bad as he had thought and that he had likely overreacted. Gellert had been nothing but the perfect host and companion the whole evening, Newt had had a good time and he like to think that the older man had too but by the end, Gellert had likely felt a bit overwhelmed with how long they had been talking. Newt knew the sensation of people – no matter how pleasant the company – wearing on one’s patience simply due to the feeling of social draining. The process by which his patience for another’s company gradually wore down over time; Gellert was a psychiatrist, he undoubtedly dealt with a lot during a normal day and thinking back on it, Newt had been rather presumptuous.

He had admittedly grown a little unaccustomed to the pace of courtship or romance of any kind – especially not the kind that Gellert seemed to be attempting to initiate with the subtle flirting and the thoughtful gift. The last Newt had had any sort of romance in his life had been with the very man who was now attempting to contact him after so very long. The space in between had been filled with quick flings with people he kept at arm’s length – something rare and fun that he never actively sought out but sometimes fell into when the loneliness and need came creeping too strong. He was only human but that didn’t mean that he should treat whatever dynamic between himself and Gellert was like it was one of those flings. Neither was he inclined to put any significant pressure upon whatever it was, but he realised that an experienced man such as Gellert wasn’t likely looking for anything like what Newt had to offer. He should simply allow whatever was going to happen, happen, and damn the consequences. e D

It was as he was coming back from checking on Pickett in the backroom where they kept their bags that Newt heard his phone ringing again, he glanced down at it, seeing that the time said that it was about half-six, the usual time that the man ringing him would be back from work. He sighed, took a deep breath and answered it.

“Hello?”

Newt let his eyes slip closed as he sat down on an upturned box towards the tiny window at the back of the room, Pickett crawling to curl up in his lap against his leg, nuzzling for warmth “Hello Albus...ah, sorry about earlier.”

“Its fine, Newt, I’m just glad we could get this chance to talk.”

“Ah yes, why exactly did you call?”

There was a pause before “I thought that I would be…prudent to check in on you.”

“Check in on me? Why?”

“Alright, maybe that wasn’t the best way to phrase it.” Albus chuckled and Newt couldn’t help but mirror the sentiment, his hand drifting to his forehead and playing absently with the strands of his fringe, glad that the other couldn’t see him.

“Maybe,” Newt conceded, pausing before swallowing and adding in a forcibly light tone “It’s been a while.” 

“That it has and I can’t help but claim the lion’s share of responsibility for that.”

Newt would’ve shrugged could the other see him but as it was, he merely sighed, the sound rattling the phone line a little “You had good reason, I’m sure.”

“How have you been? Have your studies been going well?”

The formality of it stung; like the time they had been together had evaporated and they were back to being teacher and student once more. A relationship tainted and dictated by the fact that Albus would lose his job if he ever admitted their intimacy to anyone. As it turned out, that had been one of the lesser worries between them.

“Good, I’m enjoying the work and I think that should come out with a better practical experience than I had expected from the start of the course.” He kept it polite, formal as the other and could almost feel the way that Albus would be closing his eyes, the answering exhale highlighting just how uncomfortable his former professor was with the conversational approach he had taken. Keeping it formal had not been the wisest approach and Newt wasn’t entirely sure why the usually quick-witted and charismatic man had approached it as such.

“That’s good to hear,” there was a painfully long pause and eventually, Newt sighed and stood

“Look, Albus, I’m sorry but I’m at work right now so-”

“Wait, hang on, I-” there was a long sigh “I wanted to tell you to be careful.”

“Careful? What do you mean?”

“Have you not been following the news recently?”

Newt snorted at the reoccurrence of the very same question Gellert had asked him a few days before “About the murders, yes, of course.”

“And you are not concerned?” came the earnest question and Newt felt the urge to shrug again

“It’s a rather large city and I don’t see any reason why I would be in more danger than anyone else.” He let out a sound between a laugh and a sigh “There’s no use in my worrying about things I can’t change or control.”

“Did you not hear about the last victim?”

Newt blinked “What about them?”

“A young man, Newt, a student who goes to the very same university that you do. No names or pictures have been released as it’s an ongoing case but I urge you to keep up your guard.” Newt’s eyes widened in surprise as Albus’ voice softened into a concerned murmur “When I heard that it was-“ he took a deep breath that rattled the line slightly and continued in a quieter, smoother tone “I do not relish the thought of you getting hurt when I hold responsibility for you being in Dublin in the first place. I drove you away from your family, Newt, and a place that is now seeming comparatively safe.”

Something sparked in Newt then, an old anger, a distant ache of hurt that twinged fresher even than the pain in his bruised back and shoulders. “Don’t think that my decision was based entirely around you or your wishes, Albus. I made the decision that was best for both of us and you needn’t feel any culpability for any horrible fates that may befall me simply because I didn’t fancy the idea of remaining in London for my entire life.”

“That’s not what I meant, Newt, and you know it.”

“Well, maybe it would help if you simply told me what you meant for once rather than letting me sift through every word trying to figure it out for myself.” He felt his fingers clench tightly around his phone as his tone dropped “A little forthrightness could’ve helped us then and is surely wouldn’t hurt now.”

“You’re right, of course, I…apologise.” He chuckled a tad weakly, tiredly even and Newt felt his anger deflate a little at the sound as he slumped back onto the boxes. “You’ve been working on your own candour, it seems.”

Newt snorted “Just a smidge.”

“Am I to assume that this development is a result of your charming Texan friend from earlier?” Newt could heat the playful note and couldn’t help but smile into the phone.

“That’s just Jared, he means well but happens to also be a bit of an idiot.” Newt explained, not being able to stop smiling now that it had broken through “Sorry about that.”

“It's quite alright, though I’ll admit that I was not expecting him to be the one to answer the call.”

Newt flushed a little as he realised the implications of another man answering Newt’s phone as he had “He's not-...we’re not together. He was just visiting and-"

“Newt,” came the amused reply “you don’t have to explain yourself to me. It's not a surprise that you’ve moved on. It has been some time.”

Newt closed his eyes in embarrassment and groaned quietly under his breath “I know that, but he’s still not anything more than a friend. Not him.”

In his haste, Newt didn’t realise how the words had sounded and cringed further as Albus asked with clearly arched brows even through his voice “Is there someone who is?” Newt paused long enough that it clearly gave Albus pause “Ah, I see. I’ve crossed a boundary here, my apologies."

“Not at all,” Newt hastened to reassure, though not entirely sure why “I’m just not entirely sure how to characterise what I’ve got yet enough to describe it to myself let alone someone else.”

“It’s good to hear that you have something to describe in the first place,” Albus replied with a heart-flutteringly warm tone saturating his rich voice and Newt shivered a little with an uncontrollable smile teasing his lips.

“Don’t really know how I’d describe Gellert, to be honest, even if you asked,” Newt admitted with a quiet laugh and was surprised when he heard utter silence from the other end of the line. “Albus?”

“Newt-"

“Newt! Where the hell are you! Get back in here!” Came Queenie’s insistent voice “I’m swamped, give me a hand!”

“I’m terribly sorry, I’ve got to go.” Newt hastened, standing and moving back towards his bag to drop off his phone, letting Pickett back down one-handed into his coat-pocket as he did so “It was nice speaking with you.”

“No, Newt-"

Newt hung up before he could be tempted to continue talking and dropped his phone in the top of his satchel as he headed back out to see a large queue had formed in his absence. He served solidly for the next hour, splitting his time between the barista'ing and the bookshop work. He soon found that his shift was over before he even had time to process the first conversation that he’d had with Albus since he left London. When he went to leave, he was intercepted on his route home by the memory of his promised drink with Jared at the Roe and Buck and had to divert his course accordingly. Thankfully, Jared texted him his table number and when Newt arrived, he orientated himself to said table. Spotting a half-empty glass of whiskey and figuring that his friend was probably in the bathroom, he ordered himself a pint of cider and sat down at the table to wait. 

What he did not expect to find, however, was another man plonking himself down in the seat opposite him. He was dark-haired, pale and handsome looking, rough around the edges with the sides of his slick hairstyle shaved to an oddly flattering degree. A more recently popular hairstyle from what Newt understood, but not one he had often seen pulled off so naturally or smoothly by men in their early forties as this one seemed to be. Whiskey-brown eyes glimmered from beneath dark, heavy brows and a plump, bemused smirk almost drawled at him before the voice that issued from it did.

“Evening,”

“Uh...hello?” Newt replied, unsure as to who this fellow was or what he wanted. The man’s smirk widened.

“So, how’s your night going so far?”

“Not bad, ta. Got off work, came here, been approached by a total stranger. All very fun.” Newt deadpanned, gaze searching the crowd behind the stranger for any sign of his friend.

“Sounds it,” said the man, picking up Jared's whiskey and taking a sip, Newt’s eyes narrowing as he watched, also taking in the man’s slightly rumpled dark suit, tie loosened and white shirt collar flared over his jacket in a rather haphazard-looking manner. A thick silver band on the man’s index finger clinked against the glass as he set the drink down again.

“Not to be rude, but is there any particular reason you decided to sit here?” Newt challenged with a pointedly raised brow and the man shrugged, one hand holding the glass as the other gestured nonchalantly.

“It’s the same one I was sat at before I left.” The stranger replied and Newt surreptitiously ducked his head to check the number painted on the wooden spoon in the condiment pot beside him, gratified and a little confused to note that he was indeed sitting at the right table that Jared had sent him.

“I’m sorry, but I’m meeting a friend here and-"

“So am I.”

“Well, maybe I should just go sit somewhere-"

The other man placed a placating hand on Newt’s wrist “It’s fine, Jared'll be back in a minute.”

It was then that Newt finally placed the accent, whilst undeniably Irish, held a gravelly New York twang to it and the Zoologist blinked “Oh, you’re him.”

“Him? Hmm?” mused the man “That’s what he's calling me now, is it?”

“Well, it would rather help if you gave me a name to put with a face.”

“Maybe, if you earn it.” The man replied flippantly and Newt scowled, pulling his arm back from the other man.

“Has anyone ever told you you’re a bit of an arse?”

“If it doesn’t happen daily, I find myself disappointed.”

“Well, I’ll just have to be the better man and leave you with your disappointment.” Newt stood, going to leave but groaning internally as he saw Jared approaching the table with a drink in each hand and a smug grin across his face. Newt sank back down into his seat and sent a beseeching look in Jared's direction which went unanswered as his friend sat down in the seat between Newt and the stranger. One drink going to settle itself beside Newt’s whilst the other remained with the infuriating Texan who had brought it.

“Hey, glad you didn’t chicken out on us.” Jared grinned and Newt studied the tabletop with a deliberate air of gathering himself before shooting a look at his friend.

“I didn’t really realise there was an ‘us' to be joining.” He muttered pointedly and Jared shrugged.

“I wasn’t expecting it to be honest either but here we are.”

“Here we are,” Newt echoed with an awkward scrub at the back of his head with one hand. He was trying very hard not to judge his friend right now but was finding it hard when the man who had caused Jared a lot of grief over the past few years was now sitting across from him like nothing was wrong and he hadn’t bailed on him the very night before. Driving Jared to Newt’s place in a drunken wreck.

“So,” Jared started brightly “He call back?”

“Oh yes, it went okay,” Newt said, keeping his gaze on the table as he took a long draft of his cider, relishing the sweetness and the tinge of alcohol haze that came with it, just enough to take the edge off. Both of the Americans were watching him, Jared with cocked-brow anticipation and the stranger with curiosity bordering on amusement. “Just caught up a little bit, he called whilst I was at work so it wasn’t a particularly long conversation.”

“And?” Jared prompted, taking a sip of his drink

“And what, sorry?” Newt asked, confused.

“Did he apologise? He coming to visit sometime soon?”

“Oh no, lord, no.” Newt laughed before elaborating slightly “Well, actually, yes, he did apologise but he most definitely isn’t coming to visit.” 

“Baby steps, little Newt,” Jared told him, patting him reassuringly on the shoulder and Newt rolled his eyes, prompting a laugh from his friend who Newt had noticed was gradually sidling closer to the other man. Almost as if remembering his companion, Jared’s smile brightened and he put a hand on the other man’s arm, exclaiming “Oh yeah, being mighty rude, this here is Percy.” The man rolled his eyes and Jared snorted before correcting himself “ _Percival_ , then, sorry. Detective Inspector Percival Graves ”

“And don’t you forget it.” The American drawled, one elbow propped up on the table as he stared across the room with tired brown eyes.

 _Pretentious git_ , thought Newt, his initial dislike for the man sharpening his glare even as it was focussed upon his pint rather than the detective himself. Aloud, he mumbled a half-heard “Nice to meet you.”

“Sounds it,” Graves replied, giving Newt a look that told him he hadn’t exactly masked his dislike as much as he might’ve hoped.

“Sorry, don’t happen to be the best with meeting new people.” He did the courtesy of looking up then, softening his glare into a blank expression before giving a thin smile.

“Sure, sure,” said Graves, waving a hand as to say all was forgiven, Newt’s eyes narrowed a fraction at the gesture and went back to perusing his pint, digging a cursory hand into his coat pocket to reassure himself that Pickett was both present and still had enough spiders to much on. “Sure, sure,” said Graves, waving a hand as to say all was forgiven, Newt’s eyes narrowed a fraction at the gesture and went back to perusing his pint, digging a cursory hand into his coat pocket to reassure himself that Pickett was both present and still had enough slugs to much on. He did. And the lizard also seemed just thrilled with how hot it was in the pub, the heating cranked up, the fake fireplace lit against the cold outside and the reptile was just _loving_ it. At least one of them was happy here.

Jared noticed his preoccupation and his smile turned fond “Pick doing okay?”

“Just fine, thanks.” Newt replied before murmuring more to himself “He loves it here, nice and cosy.”

“Would that be enough to make you stay for more than just a cider?” Jared wheedled and Newt gave him a patient smile accompanied by a shake of the head.

“Fraid not, he’s my obligatory reason to stay sober for the night and no amount of charm or badgering is going to change my mind.”

“Grinch.” Jared griped and Newt stuck his tongue out at him.

“It’s October.”

“Still, cold enough to be Christmas.”

“It is in a lot of places, Jared.” Newt pointed out with a sigh “Besides, it's not even that cold, you Yanks just aren’t used to it, I suppose.”

“I dunno,” said Graves with a half-shrug “I’ve found that New York can get frostier than most of Castleknock and Fingal combined. Knee-deep snow some years.”

Newt blinked a little, surprised that the American had any knowledge of the local suburbs or villages, the older man clearly noted his surprise and offered a thin smile of his own “Mam’s from the more rural areas and I’ve spent a fair bit a time round here cause of it.” He arched a dark brow and shot a look at Jared “You didn’t figure I only came for the friendly locals.” 

Newt flushed very slightly and went back to staring down his drink as Jared laughed, muttering something no doubt dirty in the other man’s ear, realising he wasn’t going to gain any response other than a tired, patient smile before adding aloud with a pointed cough “Not exactly a local and you know it.”

“Eh, you’ve been living here long enough to count as a city boy even if you haven’t picked up the accent yet.”

“It's only been a few years.”

“Humph, feels like longer,” Newt grumbled, grinning into the remnants of his cider. Jared kicked him under the table and Newt almost spills the second drink when the two glasses clash together on the table courtesy of his own elbow. He shot Jared a look “Was that really necessary?”

“I need another drink, how about you two?” Jared asked, glancing to the other two men’s glasses. Graves nodded and handed his empty cup to Jared but Newt shook his head. Jared took the empty glasses away and left Newt to stare at the table as Graves stared at him.

After a few moments, Newt looked up with a sigh and Graves asked with genuine seeming casualness “You don’t like me very much, do you?”

Newt blinked but then found himself shrugging “Not particularly, no.” He offered a bright, brittle smile “I don’t happen to find myself liking men who hurt my friends.”

Something odd flickered in Graves’ eyes then, something that someone who knew him better might’ve called hurt but Newt honestly couldn’t say whether it was just surprise at having Newt be so blunt with him. “That’s...commendable.”

“Glad you think so,” Newt muttered dryly, wondering exactly what it was about this bloke that brought out his more confident side. He guessed that it came from the indignant anger he felt for his friend and the poor treatment that he had suffered at Graves’ indifferent hand. Seeing the mistreatment of people and creatures he cared for always lit a fire in him.

“No, you’re not.”

“No, I’m not.” Newt agreed.

“But you’re pretending so that Jared stays happy.”

“That’s what friends do.”

“No, it’s not,” Graves refuted and Newt looked up, meeting his eyes in confusion as the detective leant forward on propped elbows, continuing “It’s what good friends do. Real friends. The kind that most people don’t make at university or ever, really.”

Newt’s eyes narrowed “I think you’re being a bit dramatic there, putting up with pretentious, presumptuous asses for the sake of a friend is pretty standard from what I understand of it all. If I were a _really_ good friend, I would advise him to tell you to bugger off and never contact you again.”

“You’re probably right,” Graves conceded though not with the ease that Newt might’ve expected from such a ready confession.

Newt tilted his head and said with as much politeness as he could muster “If you’re aware of this, then why don’t you leave him alone?”

“Who’s to say that isn’t what I’ve been trying to do?” the question was asked with almost complete sincerity.

Newt inclined his head pointed towards where he saw Jared still wading through the mass of customers at the bar “You don’t seem to be trying particularly hard.”

“Can you keep a secret?” Graves asked, leaning in conspiratorially and Newt found himself mirroring the inspector as he tilted his head in consideration.

“I suppose that depends entirely on what that secret is,”

Graves barrelled on, seemingly regardless of Newt’s honest though vague reply “I’m in the city because of work but I plan on sticking around. Not because of him but because of a break in my case that I’ve been waiting for _six damn years_.”

Newt’s brows rose “And why are you telling me this exactly?”

Graves broke the tension by shrugging abruptly and leaning back in his chair, one elbow propped on the arm of it as the corresponding hand made a nonchalant gesture. “I felt like telling someone.”

“Why not Jared? He’s the one you’re...involved with.” Newt pointed out.

Graves gave him a rather withering look “I’m sure you know enough to be aware that just because you’re fucking someone, it doesn’t mean that you actually think that there’s anything substantial there.”

Newt glared “You shouldn’t be admitting that sort of thing to me. Jared’s the one you should be talking to if that’s the way you think. You’ve all but ignored him so far.”

“He knows what this is.”

“I don’t think he does,” Newt bit back “Or else he wouldn’t have gotten drunk and stayed at my flat last night.”

Graves looked impressed and Newt quickly rephrased the words to properly purvey the situation “I _mean_ , that he was…upset, disappointed, when you didn’t turn up last night and even though I know he tries to play it off, he cares about you.” Newt stood and this time, not even Jared returning to the table stopped him leaving but not before he looked Graves directly in the eye and told him “Do the right thing, Detective Inspector Graves.” 

It was only after he had left the bar and was looking up a bus time-table on his phone that Newt noticed he had three missed calls. He stared down at the notifications for only a few seconds before he shrugged it off and pocketed his phone, heading off down the street with his hands buried in his pockets. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, everyone, for reading thus far and hope that you all enjoy it, have a good day, merry Christmas and a happy new year :)


	7. We’re hanging in the air

_17 th  -18th October_

It was a forgivable thing to not answer a phone call but quite another to then not call back when that person had nothing better to be doing, Gellert mused as he watched Newt leave his flat two days after their last meeting. He had quite deliberately called in the evening after he knew Newt had finished work and yet the young man had still refrained from returning his call in the night and day since. So that was what brought the psychiatrist to be standing in the bookshop a street or so across from Newt’s flat, the very one that the landlord Worme owned and one that Newt passed almost every day to get to both his classes and job. He stood in the shop, perusing the scandalously lacking ‘classics’ section and examining the one item of any arguable value in the form of an older Nietzschean volume. 

He watched the young man’s fast-paced steps past the window, noting the hunched shoulders due to the persistent pain of his injury, the darker shadows that had formed around his sea-stained eyes and the frankly eclectic manner in which he had dressed himself. It didn’t even really warrant being called an outfit as the hair-coated dark trousers, rumpled, misbuttoned grey shirt and bobbled green wool jumper more squatted upon his form than fitted. Not to mention the way the old woollen coat – no matter how well the blue might compliment his eyes and complexion – simply screamed poor make.

The one item that did not offend, however, was the gift that Gellert had bestowed upon him the night before last. The scarf, whilst not to Gellert’s usual tastes, was soft merino wool of good quality, something that appealed to the lad enough so that he might protect it from the menagerie that infested his home. As he clearly had done so. The gift in itself had not been a whim, of course, it was a careful courting that Gellert had planned out but the exact nature of the scarf – the bold, yellow and black striping had been a quirk that threw him off a little now as Newt disappeared around the next corner. It had been the image of the garment’s inspiration flying out behind Newt as he ran from his pursuers on the first night they met. The old wool thing sticking in Gellert’s mind like a small burr that then proved inspirational as he decided upon which item of clothing to gift the boy; it had to be something small to start with. Something that didn’t imply overt overfamiliarity whilst also acting as a ready reminder of himself to Newt. A trace of Gellert’s cologne dabbed here and there onto the scarf to encourage the association further.

But there were things that now warranted investigation. Firstly, and foremost, the young man who had left Newt’s flat the day before. A little digging and the cameras around Newt’s building had unearthed the man’s identity as being one Jared Harkaway, a Texan transfer student who was on Newt’s course, it seemed that they were close – close enough, certainly, for the American to feel the need to barge into Newt’s flat in the middle of the night and then stay there at his leisure. He doubted that Newt was the sort to refuse a friend in need – as evidenced by his loan to Jacob - but at the same time, Gellert did not relish the very real possibility that there could be more going on between the two students than mere friendship. His digging had also revealed this particular friend to be openly gay, and rather promiscuous, which set Gellert’s teeth on edge at the thought of the crude American having any sway over Newt; the possibility that Harkaway might prove to be a disruption to the fine mosaic that Gellert had spent a long time creating. He considered killing the man, of course, of removing the issue in a much more permanent manner straight off the bat, but something told him that it would not do to simply kill Harkaway just yet. It could prove detrimental to Gellert’s burgeoning influence over Newt; having a close friend die quite so early on in their association might put him on guard more than was perhaps practical. Send the Zoologist into an even more introverted spiral than he was already in and discourage him from confiding in anyone. Grief and fear certainly had their place in the web that would bring Newt to him but the groundwork had to be put in first. He had to encourage a certain amount of dependence upon himself and ensure that the connection between them would not be so easily broken. 

He would leave a little time before he called again and if that too failed, he would check in on the young man at his flat that evening. Gellert closed the tome he'd been perusing and replaced it on its correct shelf, nodding politely to the shop's proprietor before he left. He had an appointment booked for an hour from now so drove back to get there in good time. Gellert sorted his notes, settled into his preferred chair in his office and waited. Predictably, the neurotic mess of a man arrived early out of fear of disappointing the friend he mistakenly perceived Gellert to be.

Jacob settled into his usual routine of painfully bright, mostly one-sided conversation until he dissolved into tears less than halfway through the session. Fortunately, it didn’t take any prompting from Gellert for Jacob to take the conversation in the direction that Gellert wanted it to go, away from his pre-marital concerns, grief for his grandmother and to something _interesting_.

“And N-Newt! God, I don’t know what I’ll do if I can’t pay back Newt!” The moustached man blew his nose noisily into a tissue but thankfully refrained from dropping it on Gellert’s lacquered table surface and – almost as detestably – crammed it up his own shirt sleeve. “He’s such a great guy and I haven’t even had time to say hi to him recently. After he’s been so kind to me…” Another sob wracked the portly baker and Gellert tilted his head.

“Has your friend asked to be repaid?”

“…No.” Jacob sniffled, wiping his nose again and mainly succeeding in smearing the mess worse. Gellert had to work to keep the distaste from his professionally neutral expression.

“Then I would not worry overmuch about the money until there may come such a time that this Newt brings it up himself.”

“I guess you’re right,” Jacob conceded, snivelling a little but less so than before. “I just get so anxious about everything _all the time_ and I don’t know how to take it anymore…I keep worrying Queenie’s gonna leave me. She could do better. I know she could. I mean, she’s amazing and real pretty and…I can’t think of any reason why she’d wanna be with a guy like me…”

Neither could Gellert, but neither was he unprofessional enough to agree with his neurotic patient. “Has your fiancé ever expressed any ill will toward you? Any misgivings?”

“Well, not in so many words, but she’s always out all the time, with that chick from her classes – Val or whatever her name is. She works a lot to help support both of us and I don’t know how much we’d see of each other even if she didn’t. When we lived in London, she seemed happier with just me but since we moved here… it's like she wants more and I feel like I might be getting in the way of that.”

Oh, how very right he was. Queenie had confided in both Gellert and Vinda as much but once again, Gellert played his role as the resolute psychiatrist and leant forward in his chair, fingers steepled and mismatched gaze direct.

“Even if that is true, you should not base your entire self-worth upon your relationship with your current paramour,” Gellert said evenly. “You have been working on convincing yourself that the lion is not in the room with you, Jacob, but you have also not been perceiving the potential threats of others in a less predatory sense. You do not protect yourself emotionally and instead, fling yourself into any relationship – intimate or otherwise – with gay abandon.” He took a moment to lean back in his chair and pointedly scratch down a one-handed note on his pad before continuing, “You need to learn to control yourself when it comes to discerning the value of yourself individually and not as what you are worth to others.”

Jacob nodded, eagerly lapping up the advice as he always did as if there was ever a chance that the man would really follow it to fruition. “Yeah, yeah, you’re right. I need to start protecting myself. Keeping the good ones around.” He beamed, “Ones like Newt and Queenie.” 

Gellert fought the urge to roll his eyes as the man clearly misinterpreted what he’d just been told in rather plain terms and nodded very slightly with a tight smile. He said nothing and merely looked pointedly at his wrist-watch, feeling both glad that their time was up and that the oblivious man actually picked up on that fact and gathered his things to leave. 

Queenie did, in fact, love the man, for whatever reason; found his bumbling affection charming and ‘sweet’, but overall, Queenie knew that her true interests lay outside of small-town bakeries and older, lesser men. It was how she had been drawn into talking to Vinda about her political and social interests; what had led her to Gellert. How she had referred Jacob on to therapy with Gellert, to help that eventual transition be smoother. The girl was a useful tool, certainly, and had a good ear for gossip, she was adept at picking up relevant information and had insightful perceptions of others to pass along, but she was still a tool all the same. A perfectly placed one it turned out, to help him get closer to the younger Scamander.

Gellert glanced down at his watch again as he retired to sit at his desk, sorting through his patient notes and filing them accordingly for some time before smoothly opening his phone, dialling Newt’s number and listening as it rang. It took nearly to the end of Gellert’s patience before the boy picked up and he sounded rather breathless as he answered “Hullo?”

“Good evening, Newt, I hope that I am not interrupting anything important,” he said quite pointedly though did not let the slight frustration he felt linger in his tone.

“Oh no, sorry, just out for a run around the park.”

A run, oh how very perfect. Gellert filed that too away in his memory for later reference with a small, anticipatory smile curling his lips. Aloud, he said, “Good to get some exercise, though I would wager doing so alone at night in your situation may not be the wisest idea.”

“Maybe,” Newt laughed, seeming to slow his pace to a walk as his breathing evened out too. “But I’m nearly back home so I doubt I’m going to be brutally murdered tonight.”

“Best hasten your step, just in case,” Gellert cautioned, allowing his smile to colour his voice and it widened as Newt almost audibly mirrored it. “I was concerned that something might have happened to you.”

“You and everyone else, it seems,” Newt mumbled into the phone before Gellert heard the thumping footsteps on the other end of the line change to what sounded like tarmac. Gellert opened his tablet and after a fair few secure swipes and taps, opened up the video link that connected him to the camera mounted above the front door of Newt’s building. It was the handiwork of Worme for ‘security purposes' and currently showed an empty street but Gellert was patient. “No, I’m sorry that I didn’t get back to you sooner. It’s been a rather strange few days and I’ve found myself...out of sorts.”

“Understandable, given the circumstances,” Gellert agreed. “Though I do find myself at least partially responsible for this.”

“No, no, it wasn’t really your fault,” Newt was quick to refute and Gellert smiled inwardly as he continued, “I just-...I think that I thought something different was going to happen than what did and it threw me off course a little.” A pause, “I’m sorry for outstaying my welcome, I hadn’t quite realised how much time had passed and-"

“Newt,” Gellert cut in smoothly “You outstayed nothing and I’ll admit that you were not the only one who let time get away with you.” He let his tone drop into a lower, slightly more soothing and fond tenor, “I did not send you away because I wanted you to leave. I sent you away because I knew that you should.”

There was silence on the other end of the line for a moment but for the slightly louder than usual breaths of the younger man before, “And why would you suppose that?”

Gellert feigned apologetic near-embarrassment, throwing in a tinge of harrassedness to complete the appearance, “Because I shouldn’t be making the assumption that you are interested in the same things that I am, that you are of a similar persuasion.” He heaved a slight sigh, “It was inappropriate of me to assume that of you and I’ll understand if this changes things between us.”

He almost _heard_ it as Newt blinked rapidly in surprise, “You’ve done nothing wrong and your assumptions - your ideas about my, um, persuasion, are quite correct.” He bumbled it all out quickly and Gellert smiled as he could picture the boy blushing, his freckled cheeks lighting with that simmering rosy glow. Whenever Gellert saw it, he couldn’t help but think of other ways in which he could have Newt flushing, another way in which he might look up at Gellert through that ridiculous fringe of his and bite one of those perfect cupid’s bow lips.

But no matter how delectable the boy was, he was still merely a means to an end – an intriguing, attractive one, certainly- but he was still mainly in Gellert’s sight as a path to retribution. If he had a little fun on the way, then where was the harm? Just so long as it resulted in the suffering of Albus Dumbledore and Theseus Scamander. Who knew, maybe Newt would also prove an interesting hunt in himself but judging by how easily he had been drawn into his web already, Gellert doubted it. 

But for now, the boy required an answer and Gellert only allowed a pause of perhaps three seconds before he answered the babbling confession, injecting a little relief into his tone as he smiled, “I’m glad to hear that I wasn’t as mistaken as I had feared.”

It was then that Newt arrived in the sight of the camera and Gellert took as much time as the shot would allow to savour the sight of Newt in his running gear – and old yellow t-shirt worn slightly too tight over his heaving chest and tight black leggings hugging his deceptively muscled legs. The video quality was imperfect but Gellert found himself imagining just how it would feel to explore the young man’s toned, slender body through those tight garments and just what pretty sounds the boy might make for him as he did so.

He shook himself from his fantasies, however, as Newt’s apologetic, no-doubt well-meaning words came across the line, “I’m sorry if I caused any confusion on the matter but you can’t exactly blame me for being hesitant about throwing my preferences at people willy-nilly.” Newt chuckled nervously and Gellert humoured him by joining in before the Zoologist added, “We are talking about the same thing here, right? Aren’t we?”

“If that ‘thing’ happens to be that I find you an exceptionally attractive young man with a thoroughly admirable degree of compassion and that I wish to see you again very soon, then yes, we are.”

“Well, I wouldn’t have put it quite like that,” Newt mumbled and Gellert could hear the sound of a key scraping in a lock as he watched the young man let himself back into his house. Gellert switched views to the internal camera that watched the young man’s flat door, following him as he disappeared into the small space. The following sounds of cats meowing and a door shutting signalled the end to Gellert’s snooping for now and he switched off the connection. “But I would certainly like to see you again.”

He heard the sounds of keys being dropped to a hard surface and the shifting of clothing that implied Newt was shedding the damp layers of clothing that had been soaked by the same rain that tapped Gellert’s office windows at that very moment. He found an anticipatory smile curving his lips again at the thought of the young man stripping off so carelessly and readily in front of him.

“Would you like to meet me at the Vellia club at eight o’clock on Friday night?” Gellert asked. This should allow him enough time to properly plan the evening.

“The what, sorry?” Newt asked, genuinely confused and Gellert fought again to hide his smile.

“It’s a gentleman’s club on the east side, I can send you the address if you like?”

“Uh, yes, I suppose so,” there was a long pause and Gellert filled it readily enough.

“Is there something wrong?”

“No, I just-...when you say, ‘gentlemen's club’...what exactly do you mean by that?”

“It's not quite what I think you imagine it to be, have no fear, I have no plans to drag you into a den of strangers’ depravity.”

“Just your own, perhaps?” came the surprisingly quick response and he could tell that it had rolled from the Zoologist's tongue before his better sense properly registered it and let out a genuine laugh at the boldness. And arguable accuracy. It was rude, certainly, but Gellert didn’t find himself minding overly at that moment as he listened to the muffled splutters across the line. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like-"

“No, Newt, you’re entitled to your opinions and I really cannot deny such a bold interpretation as that.”

“Not bold so much as thoughtless, I’m afraid,” Newt admitted in a wry tone. “I don’t know quite why, but whenever I speak with you, it’s as if my brain turns to putty.”

“And yet you still wish to spend time in my presence?” Gellert asked with an amused tone and he heard a sigh.

“For some reason, yes,” came the quiet response. “But about this club...I’m not entirely sure if it’s the best place for me to be.”

“And why is that?”

“Because I could call myself a great number of things but I don’t believe that ‘gentleman’ would be one of them.”

Gellert could once again not deny the accuracy of the younger man’s words but he couldn’t have Newt disrupting his plans with such a petty thing as his estimation of himself. “That should not be a problem.”

“Why not?”

“I would wager that no more than half of the regulars of the club are worthy of being classed as such.”

“Then why would we want to go there?” Newt countered and Gellert’s lip curled slightly in displeasure.

“Because I believe that I would do you some good to encounter some individuals that you might one day be working amongst should you accept my offers as it still stands.”

“It does?”

“Of course,” Gellert told him readily.

“But...you never even told what this job is or what it entails?”

“A discussion for when we next meet, I think,” Gellert replied smoothly before continuing, “I should let you turn in for the evening, it’s getting late and I imagine that your run has likely worn you out.”

“Aha not particularly, I run quite often, have done for a few years now,” Newt laughed but acquiesced nonetheless, “Goodnight, Gellert.”

“Goodnight,” replied the psychiatrist, ending the call with a small amount of satisfaction curling within him at just the way the boy said his name. Unsure but undoubtedly fond. Yes, it felt as though things were most definitely going in the direction he intended.

It was some time later that night when he was freshly out of the shower and dressed for bed in black and grey tartan pyjama bottoms and a white t-shirt when his phone rang. He looked down at it in mild surprise, noting that it was a blocked number and hesitating only shortly before answering. There were a few deep, slightly shuddering breaths from whoever was calling him before Gellert decided to break the silence. “Not to be discourteous, but I do believe that as the initiator of this call, it would be prudent for you to speak your purpose.”

“Well, as my purpose is discovering yours, I feel that it might be even more prudent to wait for you to speak first.”

Gellert _smiled_.

“Albus, a true pleasure as always.”

“I highly doubt that,” came the derisive reply.

“You can doubt all you like, it is still the truth.” He pulled aside the crimson coverlet and sat upon the crisp white sheets below, eyes staring ahead at the partially-draped windows, the rain pattering, tracing and dripping unique patterns upon the glass.

“You know that I didn’t call to exchange pleasantries.”

“Getting straight to business then, are we?”

There was a disbelieving half-scoff, half-gasp, “What you are doing is hardly business, Gellert, it is cruelty.”

“And business is never cruel?”

“That is not the point to be debated here.”

“Is it not? Then what exactly is it that troubles you? The hour is late and I find myself in no mood for beating around the proverbial bush than you seem to be.”

“Very well,” Albus took in an audible breath. “You’re in Dublin now, I hear.”

Gellert let out an amused breath, “Do you now?”

“And I found myself wondering why you would choose to go there of all places. It holds none of the usual traits that you covet nor any particular anonymity as you are closer to your adversaries there than anywhere else.”

“Why the opportunity for a fresh start and a ready supply of psychologically complex or deficient patients seeking aid, of course,” he replied, teasing and baiting him gently, knowing what his true concern was but wanting the man to admit to it. To acknowledge the attachment - the _weakness_ \- himself.

“I can’t imagine there’s much in the way of either there that you couldn’t find elsewhere.”

“Ah, but the city has its charms, as well; more than meets the eye, fragile yet with such an enduring beauty that one cannot help but be intrigued what others might have been drawn in by before.” The words were pointed, jagged little things with which to needle Albus into bringing his honesty forward.

“Perhaps you might be better leaving well enough alone,” Albus retorted, a resolute note entering his voice. “The danger for you, the potential for exposure...surely it is not worth taking such a risk for so little gain.”

“And here I thought you were an advocate for the idea that teaching a lesson was always worth the effort expended.”

“Not this sort; vengeance, spite and malice...it is not the only path left to you, Gellert.”

“Whoever mentioned spite?” Gellert asked swiftly. “Do not assume that this reprisal is not fuelled by the most malicious sentiment of all. One you proclaim time and time again as being the very reason you stayed by my side, of all that we shared and all that you enjoyed. That you savoured just as much as I.”

“That is not the point-"

“Is it not?” Gellert cut across harshly, venom colouring his words like nothing else.

“No! My point is that you are disturbing the remains of something that would be better left alone.”

“And why is that, Albus? What exactly are you going to do about any of what you fear will occur?”

Silence.

“Exactly as I thought. You are aware that a crime shared is not so in the eyes of the law. You hold just as much responsibility for the societally perceived follies as I do,” he reminded him, voice soft and dangerous. “What do you think you can do for anyone else involved in what exists between us if you are being detained just as you intend me to be?”

“I-” he heard a deeper sigh as Albus acknowledged his position, knowing that he was helpless to involve the law in their little dance without implicating himself just as much as he would be Gellert. It was the stalemate that existed between them that kept Albus alive. The very reason that he was still around to witness the just retribution Gellert was exacting. Neither could so blatantly reveal the other without upsetting the balance and causing irrevocable damage on both sides. 

“Albus, this needn’t become something that involves you,” Gellert allowed his tone to drop into something familiarly soothing, the tone that he once reserved just for him and allowed the implications of his words to pervert it perfectly. “Who’s to say that anything will happen here? There may be more deaths in Dublin before the individual responsible finds justice but you needn’t worry about it when you’re safely tucked up in your school in London.” He allowed the tone to drop into outrightly, drippingly caustic as he finished, “Why _ever_ would you make the mistake of coming here?”

There was a longer silence than before but Gellert did not end the call just yet, awaiting the proper acknowledgement of his warning. Ensuring that the field was properly set.

“I might find that the correct incentive is enough to make me take the risk,” Albus’ voice was infuriatingly quiet and calm, a steel coming into it that he hadn’t heard in a long time and the source of that strength irritated Gellert more than he could put into words.

“Is that so? And are you sure that it will be worth the trip? A great deal can happen in the time it takes to get here.”

“Why?” came the blunt question, almost hissed into the phone, and Gellert smiled; he was finally getting somewhere. “Why are you doing this? Why him?”

“I could ask you the same. A student, Albus, really? I would say that I expected better from you but after spending some time with him, I think I’m beginning to understand the appeal.”

A derisive laugh, “You don’t understand anything, you’re doing this purely out of vindictiveness.”

“Perhaps it started out that way, yes - many, many months ago,” Gellert conceded mildly. “But I think I’ve grown to see a mite more in your pretty little boy-toy. He’s certainly got a spark to him if nothing else.”

“Months? How long have you been-” Albus cut himself off midway, evidently knowing that there was no way Gellert way going to go into the specifics of his schemes on such a traceable form of communication. He hadn’t got this far in the game without tempering even the genuine sentiment in him to a degree where even someone who was once as dear to him as Albus could draw out.

“Is there no way I can convince you that coming to London to resolve our differences directly is the best course of action for both of us?” his voice sounded weary, as if coming to the point in the conversation he had considered reaching but had truly hoped would not be its final destination. 

“I think we both know that it's too late for that, neither of us are quite so careless as all that and I find myself quite content with my current circumstances.” He smiled into the phone, “This city may be a tad drab on the weather-front but I must say that the cuisine is better than I had expected. Exotic, even. Flavours from all over and such a range to choose from.” Just as the last time he and Albus had met, Gellert couldn’t resist another stab, though this one was certainly less crippling than the last, “Tell me, Albus, did you ever get a proper taste or did you reserve your appetites?”

“Gellert, do not do this,” the tone was ice cold, biting and bordering desperate and Gellert felt that his work here was very much done. He went to sleep that night with a private smile all to himself. The game had now properly begun.

* * *

Newt lay awake for a long time that night. The shower he had taken had cleared his head and the sweat from his aching muscles but it had also, unfortunately, served to waken him. It was why he usually took his showers in the morning but it couldn’t be much helped. He had spent a while pottering about the flat, fussing over the birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians and even managing to tidy a bit too, chucking his sweaty running clothes in for a wash. However, once the display on his phone told him it was nearly 1 AM, he decided to take the risk and flopped down into the furry mess of his bed.

It was now, nearly an hour and a half later, as he stared blankly up at the crack that had spread to his ceiling with one hand curled into the duvet on his chest whilst the other gently fussed Monty, that Newt finally felt the exhaustion setting in enough to let him sleep.

He dreamt again of the deep, frozen pool in the park. It was frozen more solid than ever and his dream-self had the courage, or perhaps foolhardiness, to step out onto its snow-coated surface. He gasped as he found his feet bare and feeling the sharp, icy chills almost burning the soles of his feet as he moved steadily forward. He could see something glimmering white and bright through at the centre of the pond, a twisted, gnarled tree puncturing the surface of the ice just by that light. Despite the extreme discomfort of his frost-bitten toes and the light not holding anything extremely captivating, that was exactly what Newt found himself. He stared and stepped and stepped and stared until he was stood before the tree, its blackened, gnarled limbs twisted towards an empty, infinitely blue-black sky. The place where the tree penetrated the ice caused frigid black water to spill over the surface slightly under his weight, his toes curling over the cracked edge and dipping into the bottomless seeming depths below. He reached forward and placed a hand against the tree trunk to steady himself but gasped and fell back away from it in horror when the bark cracked and caved in under his grip, leaving a huge hole in the weathered tree. Newt skittered back across the ice, propelled by his numbed hands and feet until he heard one final, ominous _craaackkk_ below him and-

Newt awoke gasping, jerking upright in bed and moaning as his body once again protested his swift movement and the strain it put on barely healing injuries. Bloody hell, these dreams had to stop. At least until Newt’s back was better, that was. He was liable to do himself some permanent damage waking up like this.

He rolled over with a groan, realising that it was nearly midday already, he hadn’t slept that late in years and he was being punished for it now by a pounding head, aching muscles and the insistent cacophonies of multi-specied discontentment. Before he was even properly awake, he got back into the routine of care, noting with some satisfaction that Arry – the Monk Parakeet – and Lisbet – the Chaffinch – seemed to be getting along better than they had before. The two birds had been scrabbling at one another’s cages to the extent that he'd had to move them further apart, taking Lisbet away from the sunlight which, as much as he despised doing, seemed to have done the trick in calming her when he allowed the feisty bird back to her original position. It took an awful lot of gently chiding and “no, parakeet eyes are not food”s before the two properly settled down the morning and as he did so, he could feel Monty, Helga, Lila and Frederick’s hungry eyes on the birds the whole time. He didn’t like keeping any of the animals in cages or enclosures – even the ones who preferred it – but for their own safety and the general peace of the living space, it was what he had to do.

Newt took three cups of tea before his brain kicked back into gear enough to consider the conversation he’d had with Gellert the night before. It was one thing to meet with the man in the privacy of his home and make a bumbling idiot of himself but quite another to be taken into a public place – a fancy-sounding ‘gentleman’s club’ at that – and attempt to keep up with both his companion for the evening and what Gellert was laying out as being his potential future colleagues should he consider whatever the hell this job was. He wasn’t sure why Gellert was offering this aside from the face value of simply being kind or chivalrous but he couldn’t help but think of all the jobs that his brother had attempted to set him up with after he’d finished his undergraduate degree. It had been a long parade of painfully dull and uninspiring desk jobs that Newt had felt sucking the life out of him simply hearing about. Whilst Gellert was most certainly not his brother and he doubted that the opportunities he was mentioning would be of quite the same variety, Newt found himself curious enough to begin doing some research. The student opened up his laptop and settled down on the sofa, quickly googling the name of the club that Gellert had mentioned and clicked on the second result down that came after a similarly named spa in Belarus – he found himself praying that wasn’t the one Gellert had in mind. 

He found himself relaxing, however, as he was met with a nondescript black and gold design, images of well-dressed people eating exotic-looking dishes pasted across the banner header and normal-seeming website things. His eyes did water a little as he looked at the menu and price list attached, seeing nothing within what he would call a reasonable budget and mentally prepared himself to berate Gellert the next time they spoke for picking somewhere so astronomically expensive. €36 for a salad? Were they serious? Newt skipped past the intimidating menu to open a new tab and check the reviews and clientele of the place. Most of the reviews were shining, though a few were dotted in by the usual food snobs who expected more from their ‘hard-earned’ money, but Newt ignored those with a roll of his eyes. More than a little of his activist work had involved undermining people just like that and he didn’t particularly relish the thought of spending an evening with anyone like them. Not only that, but Newt was not as naïve as one might assume; he knew that ‘gentlemen’s club’ was usually a term reserved for describing strip clubs without wanting to sound too crass and though he saw nothing on the site that implied that it was that sort of place, he got the feeling that even if it was that sort of place, they wouldn’t exactly openly advertise it what with the sort of clientele they boasted. Money paid for discretion - Newt had liberated and exposed enough ‘private collections’ to be _more_ than aware of that fact. 

His research was interrupted by the beep of his phone and he opened it up to see a text from Jared

**Why’d you bail? Percy seemed kinda pissed - J**

Newt sighed a typed a reply

**Didn’t fancy sticking around to watch you two get drunk enough to fool around again – N**

**Well if it makes you feel any better, never got that far – J**

**How come? – N**

**Idfk, we had a few drinks more but by the time he’d usually start making the moves on me, he just seemed kinda put out – J**

**Sorry to hear that – N**

**No your not – J**

Newt snorted slightly and corrected

 ***you’re, and no, I can’t say I am but it doesn’t mean I don’t feel bad for you – N**

He paused before adding 

**Did he say anything about why? – N**

**Nope, just said he thought it was better if we didn’t see each other for a while – J**

Newt blinked. Bloody hell, the detective actually listened to him. He supposed that judging by the lack of enthusiasm Graves had been showing Jared whilst Newt was there, there might’ve been a bigger contributor as to why the older man made the right decision but it was still a surprise, to say the least. It didn’t stop him from feeling responsible for his friend now feeling bad. Was it really his place to have made that call for Jared?

**I’m sorry, Jared – N**

**It's cool, probs for t best tbh – J**

Newt found himself grimacing, placing down his phone for the time being, plugging it in to charge when he saw the battery was barely on fifty percent and went back to his research, this time closing the club’s tabs and switching to incognito mode before googling Gellert Grindelwald. It was something he had been tempted to do ever since he met the man and thankfully, he boasted a unique enough a name that it sparked up relevant results straight away. He found the doctor’s psychiatric practice first, the simple yet elegant design straightforward and merely directing potential clients towards a professional email address and a local phone number. It wasn’t as pretentious as Newt could have imagined it was. He flicked through other pages on the internet but found nothing in terms of social media – unsurprisingly – and a few references to pieces he’d contributed to various art galleries in central Europe. They were impressive pieces but none had remained there for long as several were marked as having been reclaimed by their creator or having been sold to wealthy individuals.

It was all in all a staggering repertoire and Newt couldn’t help but find himself further in awe as he saw that a few months before, Gellert had been involved in a major scandal involving one Mason Abernathy – a rich, detestable prick who Newt was only too aware of from his history of animal’s abuse that had been legalised by the skirting of slaughter practices around the world. Gellert had reportedly found the man guilty of crimes – though they went unnamed in the article – that were so heinous that he had been compelled to override patient-doctor confidentiality and informed the police. Abernathy was now serving twenty years in prison because of it and though Newt had been aware of the man’s arrest, he had never realised the cause for him being brought to justice, just having been glad that he had. Now, however, realising that Gellert had used his position for the good of people and creatures alike...it burned away a little of the hesitance and suspicion that had been left within him. Maybe he and Gellert weren’t quite as incompatible as he had feared. Not to mention the fact that Gellert had all but admitted that he was interested in Newt in the same way that the younger man was in him. it was all a little overwhelming – nerve-wracking, even – but also kind of exciting. He truly looked forward to the idea of spending another evening with that man and if it cost being in the company of rich, officious hypocrites for one night, well, he could probably tolerate a few hours 


	8. As you grip me like an animal

_21 st October _

The time that passes between Gellert inviting him and the night they visit the Vellia Club seem to blur into a mostly incomprehensible tirade of normal days and very much abnormal nights. The dreams had persisted, never much deviating from the lake but they always seemed to end differently all the same. Sometimes the ice cracked beneath his feet, sometimes it didn’t. Sometimes he pulled himself out of the freezing water to lay gasping on the ice. Sometimes he floated on his back on the surface; immune to the chill as an icy blankness swept over him. And other times, he lost all feeling in his deadened, thrashing limbs and sank like a stone. It always left him feeling tired and out of it first thing in the morning but he always managed to soldier his way through it with copious amounts of tea and the odd dose of paracetamol to help with the lingering ache in his shoulder and back. The cut on his arm had turned to a lightly scabbed line that he got the feeling might linger for years to come but it also acted as a reminder of the looming danger that he sensed ahead; the danger that seemed to be biding its time.

Thinking back to Gellert’s comments on his wardrobe choices, Newt had made the effort to really dig through his wardrobe to try to find something that might suit the venue they were visiting. He ended up settling upon a cider golden-brown waistcoat and white shirt with his smartest and least down-covered trousers. He even managed to once again scrape his hair into a reasonable state, topping the whole thing off with the new scarf and his old blue coat. However, Gellert’s brows still rose as he saw him walking down the street towards him. Newt found himself self-consciously stuffing his hands into his coat pockets, having left both the lizard and his portable habitat back home as he didn’t feel it would go down well but there was unfortunately still a lot of leftover sand graining the bottom of his pocket. He felt the grains pushing up under his nails as he smiled a greeting to Gellert, fingers nervously combing the insides is his pocket when Gellert’s answering smile was fond and warm in a way that he didn’t think he’d ever noticed before.

“Newt, good to see you,” the older man greeted him, leaning forward to press a lingering kiss to Newt’s cheek that left him flushing and more than a little flustered by the sudden familiarity. He supposed that his convoluted confession of his orientation had been the tipping point for the affection that Gellert was now showing him and Newt felt glad that he’d been honest – no matter how inelegantly he might have achieved it. The older man was dressed to the nines as per usual but had donned what looked to be a black military-style coat over his dark suit, burgundy shirt and gold-dotted tie, thick-soled dark shoes peaking from underneath the bottom of his pinstripe suit trousers. 

Gellert opened the door for him and gestured for Newt to enter ahead of him, the younger man smiling into his fringe as he felt the subtle pressure of Gellert’s hand on the small of his back, brief but fond and supportive, protective almost. Newt felt just a touch less intimidated by the tailor-dressed wait staff, attendants and the long, thin room that stretched out before him into the distance of golden shimmering lights, clearly affluent patrons and steaming dishes.

“Good evening, Dr Grindelwald,” the waitress greeted him before nodding shortly to Newt, “Sir.” Her attention quickly returned to Gellert as if Newt were merely an accessory on the psychiatrist’s arm and her aloofness had him wondering if that was exactly what he was. “Your table is right this way.”

Gellert took it in his stride, however, and moved them smoothly through, the waitress proving efficient as she escorted them towards the very back of the room where instead of open tables, there were large, mirrored water features dividing one half of the room from the other. There was greenery here too, long creepers of vines and fresh smelling plants lining the walls and pots around them. Newt and Gellert were settled at a table that was cordoned on two sides by two of the water features and a wall on the third, creating a private, intimate feel to the space even as it allowed them to see across to the kitchen bar area a ways across.

Newt removed his coat and sat down swiftly, apparently too quickly as Gellert had lingered on his side of the table and Newt belatedly realised that the man had been waiting to pull his chair out for him. Newt looked up as the older man lingered and asked with a cocked eyebrow, “I do hope you aren’t expecting me to stand up so you can try that again.”

Gellert smirked and shook his head, taking his own seat and seemingly attempting to reassert himself by pouring water from a carafe into each of their glasses. “Perhaps not in your recently invalided state, though I may encourage you to be more considerate in future.”

“I can’t promise anything.”

“I appreciate your candour.”

“And I appreciate your attempt to keep this relatively private.”

Gellert inclined his head, “You expressed your preferences quite clearly and I thought it best to provide a little sanctuary before we enter the lion's den, as it were.”

“I’d prefer real lions, I think.”

“I don’t doubt you would after your work with them at the London Zoo.”

“How do you know about that?” Newt asked, slightly askance.

Gellert offered him a wry, somewhat guilty smile, “I’ll admit that I did a little research into the work you mentioned and one article led to another quite quickly.”

Newt flushed lightly at the thought that the man before him had done the same thing that he had but also grimaced inwardly at the knowledge that the articles existed in the first place. “I’ve rather made an effort to keep most of my ‘work’ out of the notice of the press. Unfortunately, they tend to be vultures when it comes to picking clean anything you might wish to keep hidden,” he looked up at the older man with a slightly calculating aspect to his gaze, “Though I suppose that’s something you’ve found about as difficult as I have.”

“Whatever do you mean?” asked Gellert innocently, leaning back in his chair as the waitress returned to pour red wine into his glass, the psychiatrist thankfully forestalling her by placing a hand over the top of Newt’s glass. She looked a little surprised but quickly schooled her expression back into blank politeness and Newt found himself curious as to what she thought the relationship between he and Gellert entailed, flushing self-consciously at the possibilities. Newt silently nodded his thanks and waited for the sommelier to leave again before speaking.

“I was referring to what happened with Mason Abernathy.”

Gellert dipped his head, expression sobering somewhat, “I suppose I should not be surprised that you did some digging of your own.”

“I have to say, I’m impressed and rather grateful for what you did in exposing him. I’d been working for years against what that monster was doing and I was surprised that anyone out there actually had the wherewithal to stop him like you did.”

Gellert smiled thinly though his expression still looked a touch reflective, haunted even, and Newt was about to change the subject when Gellert exhaled quietly after a sip of wine, “I was at an impasse for some time whether or not I should reveal his crimes to the authorities, as I usually reserve a capacity for identifying redeeming qualities in people. Abernathy, however, came up quite short.” He tilted his head as he regarded his glass momentarily, “I often wonder what good might have been accomplished had I revealed him sooner but I also recognise that that decision is now in the past and that there is precisely nothing I can do to change it.”

“That sounds like a healthy attitude to take.”

“I often endeavour to practice what I preach, as the saying goes.”

“I suppose setting a good example is a better way of encouraging healthier behaviour,” Newt agreed. “I try to do the same for my creatures.”

“You abstain from shedding onto any and all items of clothing that happen to find themselves in your home, then?” Gellert teased and the Zoologist found himself brushing down his clothing in a cursory manner before smiling sheepishly up at the older man.

“I do try but it isn’t as easy as you might think.”

“I’ll bow to your greater wisdom on the matter.”

“Doesn’t happen often,” Newt admitted with a smile.

“I’d wager it happens more often than you think,” Gellert said diplomatically and Newt was spared from trying to come up with an answer by the waiter arriving and asking for their order.

Newt panicked a bit as he hadn’t even looked at a menu yet but was saved once again from his own indecision and the haughty glare of the waiter by Gellert politely informing him that he had ordered ahead. Newt waited until the waiter had nodded and left before venturing, “You ordered for me?”

“I’ve been here enough to know the dishes worth eating and yes, I took your dietary preferences into consideration when ordering for you,” Gellert told him, inhaling the bouquet of the wine before taking another sip, seeming to savour the taste upon his tongue as Newt inwardly sputtered a little.

“Don’t you think that’s a tad presumptuous?”

Gellert looked at him with some level of amusement, “I promise that if you don’t thoroughly enjoy what they serve, you can choose where we next eat.”

Newt was tempted to call out the increasing level of presumptuousness involved in _that_ answer too but refrained and simply nodded, “Seems fair.” 

“Glad you think so.”

There was silence between them for a while as Newt looked around the room, properly taking in the exquisite design and structure and pointedly ignoring the stares he could feel attempting to reach them through and around the foliage cover. He couldn’t help but imagine that Gellert must’ve made quite the impression on some or all of the staff and regulars here if he were really as frequent a visitor as he said. He certainly had on Newt after all. That thought stirred a curiosity in him and he voiced it after taking another drink. “For someone who seems so particular about what he cooks and eats, I’m surprised you go out very often.”

Gellert clearly found the question to be one he would class to be of the right sort as he smiled, “I delight in cooking and hosting far more than I do indulging in the culinary talents of others but I will admit there is certainly a place for civilised public dining. Most especially when I happen to have an in-depth knowledge of the head chef’s process.” He inclined his head toward where the kitchen door was visible by the bar area. “He happens to be an old colleague and I trust his culinary and butchery practices to be both ethical and delicious.”

Newt cocked an eyebrow, “You condone ‘ethical butchery’?”

“Most assuredly,” Gellert replied crisply. “I do not deny my own predilection for an omnivorous diet but neither do I condone overt cruelty to facilitate that.” He raised his glass once more and looked across at Newt levelly, “Livestock are slaughtered every day whether I decide to consume them or not. I see no harm in indulging in a mutually beneficial system. Pigs go to the slaughter and the consumption of them ensures nothing is wasted.” 

Newt found his eyes narrowing, condemnation colouring his tone, “But what of the conditions in which they are kept? And the way in which they are killed at such a young age? Being born to die leaves little mercy or ethicality to be had.”

Gellert’s head tilted and a strand of white-blonde hair came loose, falling forward to brush his brow, “Now we come to the argument of sentience as an affecting factor over whether there is ever any morality to be had.” 

“I don’t condemn others for their choices on whether or not they eat meat but that doesn’t mean I have to support it either,” he found himself staring a little wistfully at Gellert’s wine glass, suddenly longing for a minor buzz to ease the ache in his chest. “I do everything I can to improve the lives of creatures but I also recognise that my contribution is unlikely to make that much of a difference in the long-run. I want to educate people on this sort of thing – about why animals are worth saving and treating fairly - but I also recognise that people are aware of it, they just choose to ignore it for their own convenience.” His eyes and tone steeled here, “But that doesn’t mean I won’t fight for every single creature that I can in the meantime.”

“Which is why I think you’ll be most suited to the role I have in mind for you,” Gellert answered smoothly and whilst Newt could sense it was somewhat of a diversion, it did inspire that curiosity in him again and he sighed.

“And what exactly is this role that you’ve been so unhelpfully vague about?”

Here, Gellert’s smile became less coy and more genuine seeming, “An opportunity has arisen, as mentioned by an associate of mine; there are members of the RSPCA who work as consultants with the police. They bring cases of animal cruelty forward and act as passionate advocates for the importance of such cases. They get the work done and have the legal and charity's backing to do so.” Gellert leant forward in his chair a little, forearms resting primly upon the table as he addressed Newt, “I told my associate that I knew a promising, passionate and experienced postgraduate student who would be perfect for such a role should he choose to engage in it.”

Newt was dumbstruck. He had been expecting a secretarial job or something of the like to be pushed his way as it was ‘good money' – most certainly not a job that sounded intriguing and rewarding. But at the same time, could he really accept this job, knowing that it had been handed to him on a silver platter by someone he had known barely over a week? He knew that the reality of finding job opportunities such as this were few and far between; that very reason being one of many why he had gone back to get his master’s degree to be taken seriously. And when Newt thought of the good that he could do in that job and not be forced to bend and break laws and regulations to be able to do it...

Newt wasn’t averse to breaking laws when it came down to the welfare of living creatures – there was a shameful part of him that sometimes relished it, in fact – but being able to help animals whilst not skirting fines, arrest, prison-time and his elder brother’s staunch disapproval appealed to the Zoologist in a way he couldn’t deny.

Gellert was watching him; clearly awaiting a response and Newt had to finish his water glass down in one to be able to croak out the words. “I-...I can’t imagine this was something particularly easy to arrange. I mean, you’re a psychiatrist, you were a surgeon. When should the police or RSPCA come into any of it?”

Gellert’s expression creased a little, especially around the eyes that hinted at a deeper tension even as his eerie, beautiful, mismatched eyes remained the same. “I’ve made a great deal of social ties throughout the years and as you can imagine, a good network of dinner companions can invite an even better variety of characters.” He sipped his drink again before elaborating, “Dr Rosier is an accomplished surgeon I once worked with who turned her considerable talent to veterinary practices. As I have already disclosed to you, the surgeon's practice is a fraught and pressured one that is not for the faint of heart and whilst I would not think that of Renata, her introduction to motherhood some years ago softened her resolve to remain objective around human patients.” His fingers curled elegantly around the stem of the wine glass and Newt absently noticed the approach of the waiter as a background presence to Gellert’s words in that smooth, rich voice. “She cares greatly for her charges but laments the lack of attention the crimes committed against them receive from the authorities in wake of more human brutalities. I thought, quite correctly, I’d wager, that you would prefer throwing yourself into such a position rather than the one you currently find yourself in.”

Newt let out a slightly hoarse laugh, “You certainly aren’t wrong but...” he paused, hesitant to voice his worries without offending Gellert, but the man merely offered him a winning smile.

“It’s alright, Newt, you needn’t decide anything tonight.” He picked up his knife and fork and Newt did the same, looking down at his plate for the first time, taking in the sight of what seemed to be a butternut squash risotto. “For now, simply enjoy your meal.”

Newt dug in with fervour, tasting a myriad of seasonings and what he thought might be truffle oil, he, albeit a little begrudgingly, admitted that he would not be choosing the next place they ate and had to shelve the amusing image of Gellert eating at a McDonald’s or somewhere else as decidedly unsophisticated that would have been within Newt’s price range. The conversation ebbed to the quiet sounds of scraping forks and quiet chewing until Newt was nearly finished and he felt the need to venture some interest even with Gellert’s assurances otherwise. “I know that you said you were offering me this job because you’re…concerned-” Newt swallowed, putting his fork down, his fingers crawling forward to play nervously with the white linen square that adorned the centre of the table between them “-but it still seems like an awfully big thing to do for someone you barely know.”

“Would you rather I waited until you fell into destitution or ended up the victim of your loan shark?” there was a touch of derision along with genuine concern in Gellert’s voice, his lighter eye illuminated with the gentler sentiment in a way that didn’t quite touch the umber tint of the other.

“Well, no, but…” Newt wasn’t sure how to finish his objection and Gellert offered him a dry smile, the man's hand coming forward to rest beside Newt’s, stilling his fumbling fingers and gently taking the Zoologist’s hand in his.

“You have no obligation to accept this, Newt, but I won’t lie to you when I say that I think you should.”

Newt shook out a laugh, feeling his cheeks heating as he became distracted by the way that Gellert’s soft fingers were gently running over his knuckles. “You wouldn’t have suggested it otherwise.”

“Admittedly not.”

The quiet stretched on a while longer after Gellert withdrew his hand as both finished eating and the plates were promptly taken by the attentive wait staff. The dishes were replaced a few minutes later by some truly elegant desserts layered with cream, caramel and what tasted like passionfruit. Gellert had clearly noted Newt’s preoccupation with his wineglass earlier as a second was brought for Newt along with a bottle of what he referred to as more of a ‘dessert wine’. Newt was just glad that it proved sweet, sharp and stronger than he usually might’ve preferred as he sipped it along with his pudding.

“If I’m not mistaken, you have no lectures tomorrow?”

“It’s a Saturday, so no and I’m not working as far as I know,” Newt replied, taking another bite, absently licking a stray glob of cream from the corner of his lip, the motion catching Gellert’s eye, even if just for a moment and the man seemingly subconsciously mirrored it. Newt felt a little warm glow kindle in him at the sight, feeling a little thrill that he’d cracked the psychiatrist’s calm countenance even if for a moment. “Is that your way of asking if I’m doing anything this weekend?”

“It is,” he acknowledged, looking at Newt expectantly.

“I had no plans to be doing anything.”

“I only ask,” Gellert began delicately, his eyes almost smouldering into Newt as his hand moved forward to gently cup Newt’s chin, his thumb wiping away another stray dollop of cream he’d apparently missed. The young man felt his face warm steadily under the heat and pressure of the other man’s skin as Gellert continued, “Because I was wondering if you would like to continue our drinks in my parlour this evening and I certainly wouldn’t want to be held responsible for you being inconvenienced by a late night.” 

Newt gulped and slowly nodded into the hand still cupping his jaw before doing a small doubletake as he remembered: “I thought you wanted to introduce me to your…associates tonight.”

Gellert smiled patiently, his thumb stroking softly over Newt’s cheekbone for a moment before drawing away again. “I see no point in subjecting you to that until you’ve had some time to think about what you want.”

“Much appreciated,” Newt muttered with a fleeting smile and then nodded again. “I’d like that. To do drinks, that is.”

“Excellent,” he straightened in his chair, pushing it back a little. “Shall we?” 

A touch flustered by the sudden turn of events, Newt nodded and stood, donning his coat and snagging his scarf as Gellert led the way out of the restaurant. Newt’s eyes were momentarily caught by the red door marked private as they left and by the tall, bespectacled man who exited it and was caught short as the man came over to greet Gellert, smiling broadly and shaking the doctor’s hand in his own two large, ruddy ones. “Grindelwald! Good to see you again.”

“Rodolfus,” Newt could see the way that his companion’s shoulders tensed somewhat as he greeted the newcomer and couldn’t help but feel that whoever this man was, he was not a welcome sight. Not a trace of his distaste could be seen on Gellert's face, however, and Rodolfus seemed none the wiser as he grinned at the doctor.

“Christ, man, how long’s it been? Two months? Three? How does the time fly?”

“Four months, I believe, but I’m afraid that I’m currently indisposed for chit chat,” he gestured toward Newt, his hand once again snaking out to draw Newt that bit closer as it settled on the Zoologist’s hip. “As you can see, I have company and I find myself keen on moving on with our evening.”

The man’s blue eyes moved to Newt and looked him up and down swiftly before aiming a sly smile to Gellert as he nudged the doctor with one meaty hand, “Bit out of your usual tastes, eh?”

Newt’s flush crept up from his neck to about his ears and his eyes reflexively found the floor, examining each man’s brogue shoes with ardent fascination. He felt Gellert’s hand tense against him, only a little but it was enough to look up and see that Gellert’s jaw had tightened visibly, his eyes hardening in what looked like warning. “I would implore you to not be so dismissive, Rodolfus.”

“What’s wrong with asking a question? You’re usually so keen on them after all,” Rodolfus quirked an eyebrow and swiped a drink from a passing waiter and whilst the server frowned a little, he didn’t comment. Gellert, however, most certainly did.

“Not when they come across so dreadfully obtuse. Please refrain from insulting either of us further by continuing with your night and allowing us to do the same.” He tried to move away then, ushering Newt towards the exit with that firm, possessive grip on his waist. However, Gellert was halted by Rodulfus' hand catching him by the arm and the man leaning in to say, “Once you’ve finished with that one, I’ll see you in the back again lickety-split, eh pal?”

Gellert shook his head disgustedly and carried on, guiding Newt from the restaurant area faster than before. Once they were outside and heading down the street towards where Newt spied the doctor’s car, he found the courage to ask, “Ahm, excuse me, but what on earth was that about?”

Gellert sighed and it was a weary, long-suffering sound, “A patron of the club whom I am subjected to most every time I visit.”

Newt’s eyes narrowed and he stopped, turning to face the older man, fixing him with a hard look, “Why is it that I get the feeling you’ve brought young men here quite often? Enough to be noticed, that is.”

Gellert’s eyes narrowed a fraction too, “What exactly are you accusing me of, Newton?”

Ignoring the purposefully formal address, Newt slid from the other man’s grasp, Gellert letting him go with an increased tension to the set of his lips.

“It wasn’t meant as an accusation, more of an observation, really. It seems rather obvious that you have been here with company like me before and I’m just curious as to where we stand here?”

“No,” Gellert refuted, swift as anything and Newt’s eyes narrowed further until the elder expounded, “None like you.”

“Is that what he meant by me being not your usual taste?”

“He was intoxicated and hardly the most reliable of-"

“Don’t avoid the question, Gellert.”

“I am avoiding nothing, I’m merely pointing out all the facts to you.”

“Still. Avoiding,” Newt countered firmly and Gellert took a sudden, almost aggressive step forward, one hand clenching at his side and Newt’s sea-stained eyes darted towards it meaningfully which resulted in a further crinkling of the light lines around Gellert’s eyes.

“I...apologise. Rodulfus is someone I first encountered in a part of my life that caused me no small amount of shame. One that I would rather relinquish in lieu of-” his hand snaked around Newt’s waist, gently resting but Newt allowed himself to be drawn closer, nonetheless. “-more genuine affections.”

Newt swallowed thickly, the wine had left a heavy taste in his dry mouth, as he asked: “And what would those shameful parts entail?”

Gellert’s forehead dipped forward to meet Newt’s as his eyes drifted near closed, “Something that I fear would drive away any pragmatic individual with a decent sense of self-preservation.”

Newt looked into the other’s eyes for a long time then, seeking out the truth of things and even as it remained elusive, there still remained something that drew the response from Newt’s heavy lips with earnest fervour and a wry smile, “I think we’ve already established that I have neither.”

Something sparked in Gellert’s mesmerising eyes that sent a shiver down Newt’s spine, regardless of the night chill. “You may come to regret those words, Liebling.”

When he kissed Newt, it came as both a shock and a release. The tension dissolving into the meeting of searing, soft flesh and the taste of smoke and fire and _promise._ It tasted right in a way that Newt just couldn’t describe and as his hand came up to fist in Gellert’s shock of slick white-blonde hair, roaming through it to the barely bristly feel of the shaved sections, he found the anticipation drop even as the almost intangible fear built.

Newt drew back swifter than his body might’ve liked but the public nature of their first proper kiss compelled Newt to withdraw. Gellert’s eyes asked a question that Newt answered with a nod, lips slightly parted, breathless and unsure even as he knew that whatever happened that evening, he wanted to be with Gellert for it. It was a strange feeling, to be sure, but it felt better to be sure of _something_ in that moment. Or at all. It was refreshing in a way that was perhaps scarier than the uncertainty that opposed it.

He got into Gellert’s car for the second time in his life and was thankful that this time was decidedly less panicked and out of his control even if his heart might be racing for another reason entirely. They drove for maybe fifteen minutes before they reached Gellert’s house and the older man parked, both exiting the vehicle in silence. It was a companionable silence but still laced with the tension of expectation and maybe a little excitement on Newt’s part. He could be mistaken, but generally, inviting someone you went to dinner with back to your place for drinks was a precursor for making a move on them. Whilst he was unsure as to whether Gellert’s demeanour or offer fell into what might be considered usual, he found himself hoping that they might take that step further that had eluded them the last time he was here. Looking back, he acknowledged that doing so then might’ve been too soon.

It wasn’t until Gellert left the living room he had sat Newt down in that the latter man properly thought about what he was doing and began to panic a little, his breathing coming in a little quicker at the thought of both what might and might not happen tonight – unsure entirely which way he wanted it to go and even more uncertain of just what it would mean if he ended up spending the night with Gellert. Was he a fling for Gellert? The twinky boytoy that Jared often joked he was? The arm-candy the wait staff and Rodolfus had assumed him to be?

The fact that he’d taken his time with Newt and not tried to jump his bones the first night they met when Newt was injured and emotionally vulnerable in his car, or the time when he was half-naked in the bathroom or the last time he was here…it all made Newt think that there might be more to this courtship than just sex. Gellert had been more or less the perfect gentleman – a bit presumptuous, cynical and over-chivalrous at times, yes, but charming and caring too. He was an eclectic mix of almost sinister and oddly sweet. And Newt wasn’t sure how to handle someone who reminded him so much of the last serious relationship he’d stumbled into. The same one that had broken his heart and left him in the state he was now in. So desperately unsure of what he wanted.

When Gellert returned with two glasses of whiskey – the same as before – he downed it in perhaps three sips before the older man smiled patiently, placing a reassuring hand on Newt’s shoulder whilst taking Newt’s glass from him and carefully placing it aside. “When I invited you back for drinks, I was not aware that you had a competition in mind at how quickly we might finish them.” His brows furrowed marginally and his hand did not move from Newt’s arm as he shifted on the green velvet chaise to better face the younger man. “Is there something wrong, Newt?”

“Notatall,” Newt rasped out so quickly that the words were barely distinguishable from one another and he coughed slightly into his hand at the burn of the whiskey in his throat. Gellert took mercy upon him, perhaps for the final time that night, by refilling Newt’s glass from the amber-stained decanter and passing it back to the Zoologist who swallowed half of it down gratefully. It all seemed to hit him in a rush and he felt rather dizzy in that moment, tilting a little towards Gellert’s stout, warm _solid_ frame. The older man’s hand came to once again tilt Newt’s face up, looking deeply into his eyes with more than a little concern, but Newt didn’t pay much attention to that as he followed both the pull of gravity and his own sudden convictions and pressed his lips forward to meet Gellert’s. There was a moment of indecision clear in the taste and tension of the other man before Gellert’s hand came up abruptly to fist into the back of Newt’s hair, pulling the student’s head into a better angle for the shorter man to control even as Newt returned the kiss passionately.

Newt let out a breath of near panic into the kiss seconds later and felt a thrill as he realised that he was kissing Gellert. Then the panic came again as he realised that he was _kissing Gellert._ He tried pulling away then but as Gellert’s free hand moved to cup Newt’s hip and draw him closer, the Zoologist found himself not caring when he felt the man’s strong fingers dance down his back to tease bare skin as they slipped up and under his shirt. Newt gasped, arching into the touch as the other man’s fingers traced the dip at the base of his spine at the very moment Gellert’s lips moved to bite at the corner of Newt’s lips with an almost vicious fervour.

“Mano mielasis,” the foreign words were murmured hotly against his cheek in a breath of warm whiskey and sweet caramel that lingered along with something that was entirely Gellert. They still made Newt shiver as his own hands began to explore the other man in kind, one grasping about broad shoulders whilst the other slid along Gellert’s thigh. The man shuttered a breath of his own, his captivating eyes half-lidding as he pulled back to look at Newt. “But lord are you not beautiful.”

“You-your eyes...” Newt found himself gasping, witnessing how they shone so very brightly in that moment, the silver almost dipping into an oh so familiar blue in the dimmed light of the room and Newt’s oh so hazy perception. The young man’s hand drifted up hazily to Gellert’s face, trembling fingers stroking lightly over the crinkle lines about the silver-possibly-blue one with a simple fascination.

Gellert’s pale brows knitted together minutely but he was for once the one saved his questions by Newt diving forward, his large lips sinking into the hollow of Gellert’s throat even as his numb feeling fingers fumbled at the man’s collar and tie. The psychiatrist's thankfully steadier digits came to aid the Zoologist’s. This might well have more been to save his fine clothing rather than just out of his own desire, though there was a fair amount of that colouring those confusing eyes too if Newt was any judge. And the hands that held the back of Newt’s thighs, kneading them firmly...they most definitely felt more like the touch of a man in the throes of desire than the calm, collected, suave doctor that Newt had known until now. He gasped as Gellert untucked and pushed Newt’s shirt aside, raking it up his stomach to tease the quivering flesh there, tracing the trails of light hair and setting sparks tingling down Newt’s exposed sides. “Gellert!”

Each man's waistcoat came off in quick succession under contrastingly hasty and careful fingers and half of the buttons on Gellert’s shirt along with his gold-dotted tie before the older man was suddenly pushing him down to lay horizontally on the chaise, the psychiatrist above him, eyes bright and focussed.

“What is it that you want, my little Newt?” And oh, if Gellert’s voice wasn’t the softest he’d ever heard it, so careful and teasing that Newt found himself squirming a little under the other man, his hips bucking slightly up into Gellert. The older man chuckled lowly, one large hand pinning Newt more with the gesture than any strength but Newt felt the strength that resided there all the same. Newt’s chest heaved, shirt splayed out to both sides as a stark contrast to the rich velvet below him as his eyes roamed from his own form to appreciate the one half-pinning him.

Gellert’s once neat hair was hanging loose now around his pale face, framing it in a way that cast shadows that sharpened his cheekbones and angular jaw. His eyes had dipped to shadow that clouded the contrast between them to a slight gleam of silver and the darkest of umber-pitch. His lips were just barely parted as Newt stared up at him, panting faintly and tense with anticipation. A pale brow cocked as Newt remained silent and he belatedly realised that the doctor was awaiting an answer once more.

“W-what?” he managed to breathe out and Gellert pushed a stray lock of hair from Newt’s forehead with a patient, dangerous smile.

“It’s quite a simple question, Newt, what do you want me to do to you?”

“I...” Newt tried to lever his elbows up below him enough so that the blood in his body might decide to relocate from other areas that were making it rather _hard_ to think. Gellert allowed it but only a little, putting his other hand firmly against the younger man’s chest and preventing him from coming close enough to steal another kiss...or do much else for that matter. “I don’t know.”

Gellert’s hand cupped his chin and tilted his face up so that he was directly looking into Newt’s eyes and asked for the second time that evening, “Is there something wrong?”

Newt was halfway through shaking his head when he heard Gellert sigh and the man withdrew, letting Newt up and the younger man let out a shaky exhale, following Gellert up to settle next to him on the chaise in a more upright position. “Gellert, I-...it’s alright.”

“No, Newt, there is evidently something bothering you and I don’t generally make a habit of engaging in activities such as these with someone in such a state.” His eyes searched Newt’s earnestly, “It often leads to...complications.”

“That’s an awfully polite and vague way of putting it,” Newt huffed, pulling his open shirt a bit more to rights on his shivering shoulders, though he was unsure why he was shuddering in the first place. Adrenaline, he supposed distantly. “And there’s nothing _wrong_ , per se... I just-...I haven’t done this sort of thing in a long time.”

Gellert raised his eyebrows, looking impressively cool despite his half-undressed, somewhat dishevelled state. “Did you not just reprimand me upon my apparent vagueness?”

Newt’s hands clenched in his lap, fingers gripping tight to the material of his thin trousers as his gaze fixed upon the tiny patch of green velvet seating left between them. He tried to channel a strength and solemnity like the kind that Albus treated _him_ with once upon a time; remembering how the tone had always worked to keep things steady and easy between them. As much as that was possible towards the end. “What I’m trying to say is that I’m not entirely sure what this is between us and that leaves me rather uncertain as to how things should proceed.”

Gellert’s brows furrowed very slightly as his hand came to grasp Newt’s shoulder, supporting him lightly, guiding Newt’s gaze up to meet his again. “As I said before, there is no pressure for you to do anything that you do not wish to do.”

“But I do want to-" Newt took a deep breath, “It's not that I don’t want to – it’s _not,_ ” he took another breath before quietly admitting, “I haven’t had anything more than a one-night stand in over six years and the last relationship I had ended-...well, I told you it ended badly but I haven’t ever really told anyone why.”

“Do not feel obliged to break that streak now on my account, you owe me no insight in this and it clearly pains you to speak of it further,” Gellert attempted to console him but Newt shook his head, the alcohol emboldening him and something else he couldn’t quite put his finger on. He could sense the evident curiosity in the other man’s gaze and his own need to confide in someone finally overrode him in wake of that curiosity.

“No, I-...it ended for a lot of reasons, I think, but A-...he told me that it was because one should never become involved with someone when their heart belongs to another and their thoughts remain there too.” He let out a hoarse laugh and offered Gellert a thin smile, albeit a bitter one, lids lowered and eyes so very bright. “It came nearly a year late, however, and I find myself not wanting to make the same mistake again by expecting something of this or you that will be proven false or will end poorly for both of us.”

Gellert’s mismatched eyes were wide, hard and blank as though they had crystalized and his grip on Newt’s arm had hardened too, practically painfully tight as the doctor’s neatly trimmed nails dug in through Newt’s shirt. Newt’s eyes widened as he looked deeper into the other man’s eyes, trying to find something there that could explain his companion’s sudden…whatever it was. It took a few more moments before Gellert moved and Newt was tempted to say something, to take back the cavalcade of pent-up emotion he’d just released upon a man he barely even knew…when Gellert’s expression cleared, his grip loosened and he gently tilted Newt’s face up to meet his in a sweet, surprisingly soft kiss that belied the passion of their earlier ones. When he withdrew, Newt’s lips remained parted at first, unsure of what that had meant or why Gellert suddenly looked so…odd.

“Newt, I assure you that my intentions towards you are anything but trivial.” His head dipped a fraction, eyes lidding momentarily before he continued, “It sounds as though you have fallen prey to the whims of someone who is uncertain of themselves and has projected and unloaded that insecurity upon you.” He leaned in close, eyes smouldering once more as he breathed, “You needn’t allow the failures of the past affect your future enough to deny you what you want.”

Newt couldn’t help but nod into the kiss that claimed his lips and returned it with fervour, his hand gripping the back of Gellert’s neck to better direct them both, surprised as Gellert let him. The Zoologist’s shirt soon found itself forgotten on the floor below them, Newt’s foot catching in it briefly as it left the floor when Gellert once again guided them back onto the chaise as if the interruption of Newt’s uncertainty had never occurred. Though there was a tangible difference between the before and after of the confession, a less obvious tension and tenor running through their touches that Newt did not seek to name, merely enjoying the feel of fingers creeping down his spine and fisting his copper curls in an almost one-sided war for dominance. Newt already knew from long experience what side of that war he wanted to be on and if Gellert’s actions and temperament were any gauge, so did he. They were both stripped to the waist and Gellert was working on Newt’s belt when a familiar, but wholly unwelcome ringtone rent the air. Newt sighed exasperatedly into the skin of Gellert’s neck that his lips were currently exploring and Gellert’s head popped up after perhaps the tenth ring. Newt glared over his partner’s shoulder at where he knew his phone to be residing and it rang in his coat pocket on the chair nearby. Newt silently willed it to ring out.

It didn’t. It paused for a few seconds of merciful bliss before it began ringing again and Newt sighed again, attempting to right himself so he could go over and switch his phone off. Gellert did not let him up so easily this time however as his fingers dipped below the waistline of Newt’s trousers, tracing the sensitive dip of his navel with featherlight touches and the barest hint of nail digging in as they dipped lower. The older man’s lips mapping a path down the younger’s neck, seeming in search of a bit more vocality from the Zoologist which he got when his other hand fisted tighter in Newt’s hair, arching his neck back as shockingly sharp teeth worried the soft flesh of his throat. 

“Gellert, I’ve just got to-”

“No,” the word was growled against his throat and Newt gasped as the teeth dug in painfully, the younger man’s eyes almost rolling into the back of his skull as pleasure shot through him like a firecracker, sharp bright and stunning. “You don’t _have_ to do anything.”

“So you keep saying,” Newt gasped, caught halfway between wanting to extricate himself from the grip and sink further into it until Gellert tasted blood. It wouldn’t be the first time Newt had encouraged such carnal behaviour. Or partook in it either.

“Would you rather I told you exactly what you should be doing at all times?” came the slightly snarky reply murmured into his neck and Newt shook his head as soon as the teeth locked into it released him enough to do so.

“Perhaps not all the time, no,” Newt began slowly before offering what he hoped was an enticing smile, “But I think there’s a time and a place for it, don’t you?”

Gellert’s answering smile was blinding.

“I couldn’t agree more.”


	9. Be Good to me

_October 21 st _

It was one thing for his plans and influences to go just as he expected, just as he hoped, but quite another for the boy to quite literally invite Gellert to dominate him. He knew that Albus’ predilections had always run with a darker vein, as dark as his own, but he hadn’t quite believed that his ex-partner had managed to either find or mould a boy such as this to the very tastes of people such as Albus and himself…it was quite miraculous indeed. Gellert was, of course, aware that such fetishes had become far more prevalent in recent years, there was more acceptance for the lighter end of things thanks to the raunchy, tasteless and horribly inaccurate book written by sexually frustrated housewives with too much time on their hands. But this desire he could feel seeping from Newt, the clear desire to submit that belied his stronger tendencies that had him challenging Gellert…it was an intoxicating blend that had the doctor wanting more. He wanted everything from the redheaded boy beneath him and he wanted it almost more than the caution involved in his plans would allow. He would have to take care not to get too carried away here. Could not allow himself to fall. Ironic as it may be, both men present had felt the sting of what that fall could bring and had done so in the company of the very man that Gellert felt sure was trying to contact Newt again now. Well, he simply couldn’t allow that to happen. 

He pressed kisses to the boy’s skin, tasting it and coaxing the pale, freckled beauty into making more of those enticing little gasps and moans, those sweet sounds that seemed to play only when he struck the right notes and when his hand made its way past the waistline of Newt’s trousers, he earned the loudest one yet. He wasn’t about to waste this opportunity in the living room, however, and pulled the youth up by the back of his slender neck, fisting in the copper curls at the nape of it and guiding him up and off the chaise. The young man’s gangly legs that should have looked ridiculous, tangled in his unfastened trousers as they were, somehow still managed to look as tempting as the tight jogging-wear he’d worn before had alluded. Newt’s trembling fingers shot to hold his trousers up around his waist, nails gripping visibly tight into the leather of his unbuckled belt and wide, sea-stained eyes fixed upon Gellert with evident anticipation. 

“Follow me.”

It wasn’t really a question but the boy nodded anyway, eyes uncertain and shining like nothing he could adequately put a name to even with the plethora of languages and dialects at his disposal. He called them sea-stained because they shifted and changed such as the tides and the hues of the ocean itself – affected by light, temperament, pull and what dwelled within. Blue one moment, almost to rival Albus’. Green another. Fleetingly hazel. But also, oddly nearly as captivating as his own. Unique, certainly. They were not the most captivating feature of the individual that he led up the curving iron staircase to his bedchamber, drink in hand, but they were most certainly one of the few aspects that could not be fully appreciated through the captured images of security cameras or jpeg images found on the internet. Gellert did not consider himself to be a sentimentalist, but he could certainly identify and appreciate true beauty. A keen eye, as it were.

And that keen eye, both of them, in fact, drank in the sight of the gorgeous young man turning back to him as he stood before Gellert’s ebony four-poster and its black silk sheets as a perfect contrast to the darkness that seemed to envelop him. The look in the boy’s eyes had morphed from wide-eyed anticipation to something much more sultry, something that better suited the way his hips moved as he finally slid the unworthy fabric down his long, slender legs and stepped out of his trousers and towards Gellert. What drew an almost unheard snort of amusement from the older man, however, was the sight that greeted him as his gaze lowered to the area that the boy suddenly seemed so keen to offer up. 

“Really Newton, I had not expected you to be so shameless.”

Newt smiled almost lazily up at him, a habit that confounded Gellert slightly what with the evident height advantage the younger man held over him. The lashes shading those peculiar eyes shining lighter in the dialled-dim light of the room, the direction of it all practically encouraging Gellert to continue regarding the tight midnight-blue briefs that clung so flatteringly to every curve of Newt’s body that they touched.

“You must be rubbing off on me,” the younger man teased, voice low and the ever-present husk dropping into such a liquid sin he hadn’t expected from such a nervous, fragile thing. Newt punctuated the goad by pressing closer to Gellert, nimble though trembling fingers moving to Gellert’s belt and quickly working it off, the other hand pushing fine silk from the doctor’s shoulders and carelessly shedding it to the floor below them.

That was nearly the last straw for Gellert as he growled low in his throat, gripping Newt tight by the boy’s prominent hips and lifting him, allowing the other man’s long legs to wrap themselves around him in a desperate attempt at stability as Gellert drove them both towards the bed, hitting the edge and tumbling onto silken sheets with low grunts and groans of approval jumbling into one another’s lips as Gellert kissed Newt once more. He claimed him swiftly and thoroughly, pressing his fingers under the flimsy protection of Newt’s underwear and digging in hard enough to bruise, the movement being enough to draw another low moan from the boy below. He took a strong grip of Newt’s wrists before the younger man could make the mistake of thinking that he was in control here, yanking them up and above his head, intoning, “ _Stay_.” 

It had the desired effect as Newt wisely stayed put, allowing Gellert the opportunity to stand, sliding off the bed and going to the cupboard in the corner, the lower drawer unlocking swiftly under his sure movements and Gellert only smiled to himself for a moment before he turned with a length of thin yet strong black rope held taut between his hands. “Are you sure that you’ve fully considered your decisions tonight, Newt?” 

Newt looked at him with wide, pupil-blown eyes, frozen in the position Gellert had left him in, thin chest heaving slightly, a prominent bulge shaping his remaining item of clothing and plump lips parted as he answered in an honest and suitably anxious tone. “Not at all, but where would the fun be in that?” Gellert found himself agreeing quite readily. The little cocktail he’d made Newt earlier hadn’t been blended on a whim after all. The perfect blend of potent, aged whiskey, a little splash of Gellert’s special seasoning for flavour and just a little something extra to lower the boy’s inhibitions that bit further than the drink alone would have provided. Something to loosen Newt’s tongue too. And it seemed to have worked quite well indeed. He made quick work of drawing a serrated, black-frosted blade from the same cupboard he’d stowed the rope, feeling the boy’s gaze fixed on every movement with a healthy amount of caution as he cut the rope into shorter, more manageable lengths, putting the knife to one side on the bedside table and climbing to kneel above Newt once more.

“You’ve done this sort of thing before, I trust?” Gellert asked, one brow inquisitively cocked, “Indulged yourself and the appetites of others?”

Newt nodded, that pink hue creeping up his neck again, masking the freckles there and accenting his features. “A few times, yes. To, ahm…varying degrees of success.”

“Oh really?” he asked wryly, moving closer, hand brushing over Newt’s knee so softly that a shudder ran through the young man as the length of rope in Gellert’s hand followed the path of the elder’s fingers. “And what exactly would you class as ‘successful’ in such a venture, if that is how you are defining it?” 

His hand reached the apex of Newt’s hip then, the rope slipping over the sensitive flesh of his inner thigh and briefly brushing over his confined arousal. “I-I-I would’ve thought that would be r-rather obvious,” Newt stuttered, the boy half-undone already by the mere feeling of the rope sliding across his heated flesh. Gellert knew just where the most sensitive receptors in the skin were, for pain and for pleasure, and he knew just how to manipulate both to his own pleasure and purpose perfectly by this point.

“Perhaps,” Gellert conceded and finally drew the rope up more swiftly, less teasing now as the material bordered friction burn with the speed and pressure that Gellert wrapped it expertly in between and around Newt’s wrists, working an intricate knot that, whilst tight, did not leave as heavy a mark as it could’ve. He didn’t want to scare the boy off too soon nor give his companions and family any sign that anything might be amiss, not just yet anyway. With Newt securely bound to the headboard, Gellert allowed himself the opportunity to properly explore the feast laid out before him.

“So, tell me, Newt,” Gellert half-purred into his ear as one hand reached beyond Newt’s field of easy vision and took a hold of the third glass of whiskey, the ice cubes in it tinkling slightly against the sides as he did so, “How do you feel about the cold?”

“N-not an overly big fan of it,” Newt half-laughed, attention fixed on the movements of Gellert’s arm and alighting as they saw what he was holding in his hand before snapping up to properly meet Gellert’s. The doctor took great care in removing one slowly melting ice cube from the drink before drawing one now icy cold finger down the jut of Newt’s collarbone and the younger man shuddered out a low sigh, his eyes drifting closed in ecstasy as Gellert watched on in fascination. “T-though I suppose everything h-has its exceptions.” 

“Does it now?” he encouraged lowly, dipping the finger once more and this time running it over Newt’s quivering belly, the muscles there contracting as he instinctively shied away from the cold but the sinful smile that spread those delectable lips told a different story than his body’s natural reaction. He drew the most pleasurable sound, however, as the next cube ran over Newt’s left nipple. Newt’s knee jolted up on impulse and came dangerously close to striking the older man in the groin and it was only the boy swiftly halting the reflex that prevented quite a bit of pain on both their parts. As it was, the edge of Newt’s knee merely grazed against the taut material of Gellert’s pinstripe trousers and the shudder that ran through the doctor seemed to have almost as much of an effect on the student as it did him. Gellert’s shoulders rolled as adrenaline surged through him, the shudder becoming a full-body thing that had him leaning close to speak quietly, directly to the boy beneath him, eyes ablaze, “If you do that again, Newt, I cannot be held responsible for what comes next.”

He wasn’t entirely surprised when the motion was repeated with clear deliberateness moments later, Newt’s knee grinding against Gellert as the younger man’s thigh slid between Gellert’s, rubbing and wanton. Gellert’s hand quickly found Newt’s throat, throwing his head back into the headboard with a deceptively light thump for the force applied as the doctor’s grip constricted just enough to leave the younger man gasping. Newt’s pupils were blown wide, his hips still shifting and hitching against the pinning weight and evidently wanting more for every second that his airway was limited.

There was panic present in the boy’s face. Of course there was, it was only natural, after all, but he couldn’t control his masochistic tendencies any more than Gellert could help his desire to exploit them. What a pair they made.

Gellert was drawn once more to the youth’s exquisite mouth, kissing him and taking in every strained breath that Newt managed, relishing in the panicked, plush feeling of the struggling man beneath him. He eased off enough to allow Newt his consciousness, to prevent him from dropping away too quickly and Gellert destroying the delicate balance between them. The Zoologist gasped in air, pupils blown ever wider, eyes practically black as the ever-shifting irises were eclipsed by fear, lust and adrenaline. He managed to breathe out words however and despite himself, Gellert froze in his ministrations at the conviction that suffused those words: “Do that again.”

His pale brows rose at the command, the attempt at assertation, but then he supposed that the boy was not truly aware of the danger he was in at that moment – the fact that he had willingly, eagerly permitted himself to be bound and spread out by a highly adept killer with tastes above the usual. He only saw what Gellert wanted him to and as much as there was part of him that wanted to see how well Newt would wear his true terror when it finally came, he was content in savouring the shadow of it for now. Keep the illusion going.

He withdrew from the next kiss only when his own arousal proved to be stronger than anticipated and he leant back onto his haunches, his weight resting on Newt’s legs, keeping him pinned even as Gellert began to remove his own trousers, folding the garments with a pointed eyebrow at the younger man who had the gall to stick out his tongue at Gellert, rocking his hips up once more, sweat beginning to bead and trickle down Newt’s bare skin as his hands surreptitiously, instinctively tugged at the ropes binding him. Gellert had no doubt that the student wanted to get his hands free to urge Gellert on and stop the teasing but the doctor was quite content to let him squirm a little longer. The young man’s eyes were still more than a touch hazed from the drink and what had been mixed into it as well as a number of other things that were decidedly less definable. 

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Newt couldn’t remember the last time he had felt both this relaxed and contradictorily wired at the same time, his whole body was alive with arousal and anticipation but his mind felt…steady, a little nervous maybe but mainly just eager and open. There was a kind of trust involved in this sort of play that he rarely gave out to anyone but even when he did, there was usually a…withdrawal. A part of him that refused – was simply unable – to trust his partner with this level of control. The last person he had trusted to this degree had of course broken his heart and shattered his trust. The latter having oddly enough come before the former. There had been a night shortly before the inevitable split between them, weeks before, in fact, when he and Albus had begun their games as they often did, Newt having been left in Albus’ office for what his teacher had assured him would be mere minutes as he sent away the very much unexpected visitor who had knocked on the department door at eleven o’clock at night. Newt had been nervous, of course, naked, bound to the older man’s desk chair and blindfolded to boot; a new step they didn’t often take as Albus had told him he missed seeing Newt’s expressive eyes too much to cover them for long.

But after minutes had stretched to what Newt knew to be hours – had watched the minutes tick by on the clock on the office wall after he’d managed to dislodge the silken tie wrapped around his face with several inelegant shoulder movements – he had begun to fight the bonds holding him. The fear of being left there had set in. He had trusted Albus and his lover had never let him down before, he had always been there to comfort and gentle Newt any time he grew too distressed during their time together…but that had been the first time that Albus had broken that trust. It had been nearing two in the morning when Albus had finally returned, looking pale underneath his tan, hair and clothes dishevelled, clearly deeply shaken and he had rushed to untie Newt with trembling fingers, not saying a word nor answering Newt’s stuttered out, furious questions. Things hadn’t been the same after that. Albus no longer looked at him when they saw each other around the university as he used to, no longer greeted him or answered any texts or calls Newt sent his way.

It was just over a week later before Newt had finally decided to force the issue and arrived at the professor’s home late at night, keeping his hood up and dressing in muted colours as he always did whenever he met his partner at his house lest the neighbours get wise to what was going on between the teacher and student. Despite Newt most definitely being a consenting adult and he and the teacher being in different departments, Albus had still insisted that discretion was the best tactic for both so as to not sully either’s reputation or risk their places at the university. Newt had understood but at that point, there was part of him that was concerned Albus had finally grown tired of Newt and was ghosting him because he had found someone else to entertain him. He had been angry. He had wanted answers. As it turned out though, he hadn’t gotten them and to this day, Newt got the feeling that the platitudes he _had_ received had only been half-truths.

It had been the point where Newt realised that the man he had spent the better part of a year with and had grown to love was never going to be entirely honest with him. That they couldn’t sustain what it was between them if Albus didn’t even have the decency to tell him the truth about why he had left Newt in such a vulnerable position and why he hadn’t the courage to continue their association afterwards. It confirmed the suspicions that Newt had had earlier on in their relationship – Albus had not seen him as an equal and never would.

What Newt felt now, however, it felt both eerily similar in ways he couldn’t quite describe as well as wildly different. _Gellert_ was different. And whilst Newt wasn’t yet sure if it was a good kind of different, he saw no harm in seeing where it went. The warm, confident feeling that was swelling in his chest and fuelling his arousal…surely it was worth the potential for a little more pain? He wasn’t in too deep and he felt pretty confident that he could draw himself back before he started getting too invested in whatever this was. If he couldn’t even put a name to it, then surely it couldn’t be too far to fall even if he did.

For now, he just relished the feeling of Gellert’s tongue gliding down his abdomen and dipping teasingly into his bellybutton as Newt bucked and writhed beneath him, working for every inch of contact he could get and _loving_ the lack of control he had. He didn’t know where the pleasure came from in situations like this, being helpless usually made him afraid, frustrated beyond belief – not being able to do anything about his problems was not something any man wanted. But in smaller, regulated doses…he supposed that the psychiatrist currently pinning him might tell him that it was cathartic in a way. Therapeutic, perhaps; to relinquish control for a short while to someone he could trust and revel in the simplicity and carnality of it all. All thoughts of _why_ he enjoyed it, however, vanished from his mind as Gellert’s adept fingers hooked into the elastic of Newt’s underwear – presumptuous or perhaps just optimistic as they may be – and tugged them down, finally exposing Newt’s throbbing member to the cool air of the room. The black silk of the bedcovers now touching every bare inch of the underside of Newt’s body as the pants were put to one side just as carefully as the older man’s trousers had been, belying Newt’s earlier hastiness.

“You still haven’t told me what you want, my dear Newt,” came the silky reminder and Newt blinked slowly, mind distracted somewhat by the fingers dancing down his sides and trailing across his pelvic bone, teasing ever closer to where Newt wanted them most right now but for some reason, the only thing he could think he wanted in that moment was to have his lips wrapped around what was currently pressing against Gellert’s tight black pants. It wasn’t a particularly new desire, out of the sexual encounters he’d managed to snag over the past few years, his own desire to get down on his knees has become an undeniable theme. A popular one at that as most blokes weren’t going to turn down the level of enthusiasm that Newt felt for the task nor what Jared so helpfully referred to as “perfect pouty blowjob lips.” Newt forced his friend's lewd words from his head and instead focussed on the man currently hovering over him like a bird of prey, ready to swoop down and devour him at any moment. If Newt had his way, _he_ was going to be the one doing the devouring tonight.

He swallowed a few times to get the moisture back in his mouth both for the words and what he was asking for, voice low and huskier than usual which he felt working to his advantage at the look on the other man’s face. “I want you in my mouth right now. I want to taste you in the back of my throat and I want you to come undone there knowing that was all it took.”

He felt his lips spread in a sinful smile, one of temptation and daring and _want_ , his tongue darting out to wet his lower lip very deliberately, remembering just how that had seemed to entice the doctor’s attention earlier at the restaurant.

“Oh you sweet, trusting thing.” It was sighed out into the air like a prayer coming from an atheist; almost unwilling but breathed with something akin to relief all the same. “There’s not a word for what I want to do to you.”

Before Newt could consider what exactly the implications of _that_ could be, Gellert was reaching up and deftly untying him, fingers working the knots until Newt’s near-numb hands fell free, loose and tingling down to clasp at one another, rubbing his wrists lightly as they fell to rest against his own chest. He felt obliged to follow Gellert by swinging around on the bed, legs dangling over the side and his feet burrowing into the soft midnight blue carpet when the older man stood beside the bed, somehow resplendent in only his underwear and silhouetted against the heavy drapes that matched the carpet, the expensive material covering the floor-length window behind and matching the stature of the man before Newt perfectly.

At first, Newt was unsure of how to approach this, seeing so many different ways he could position himself and having learnt from experience that some ways were better than others for both involved. But after taking one look at Gellert’s face and his own gaze then following the older man’s to where Gellert’s belt lay innocently on the carpet nearby...he knew what to do and hastened to do it. He picked up the belt, feeling the heavy, finely stitched leather in his hands and revelling in it for a few moments before the belt was taken from him. The leather loop did not go around his wrists as he had expected, however, and Newt found his breath hitching again before any pressure was even applied as it was looped loosely around Newt’s throat. Gellert didn’t tighten it, simply let the cool leather lie there against the heated skin of Newt’s chest and neck, a solid reminder, and as much as a part of Newt felt rather dubious at the overtly possessive gesture and his lips curled slightly in response to that feeling…it somehow also made him feel safer, stable perhaps. He sometimes exercised similar grounding techniques when calming wild animals, a firm gesture or loose, un-invasive restraint that acted as a simple reminder, a mooring line. 

Newt licked his lips, eyes fixed on Gellert’s as the older man stared down at him, expectant and a touch of humour glinting in those mismatched orbs, a bit of daring. Newt responded to it by placing his newly wetted lips gently against the flesh of Gellert’s inner thigh, kissing it and suckling there for a moment before moving across to the other one, repeating the gesture as his hand slip along the thigh he had just kissed. He smirked into pale skin as he heard a shuddering breath above him, felt a tell-tale twitch against his cheek that told him he was doing just fine. Newt took great care in pulling down the other man’s underwear, shuffling back just slightly out of Gellert’s reach as he did so, Gellert aiding the effort only by stepping out of the material that pooled at his feet. Newt took a few moments to properly take in the man before him, or least this aspect of him that had been hidden until now, noting with some satisfaction that Gellert was most definitely on the larger side, not thick exactly but longer than average and with a slight curve to it that had Newt all the more curious as to how that would feel inside of him.

He took Gellert in, licking at the head of his erect cock with fervour and suckling on it until he heard a satisfactory moan that spurred him on to take in the man further, sucking the shaft in inch by inch with dutiful fervour. Strong hands tangled in dishevelled copper curls, pulling and kneading into his scalp rhythmically until it felt as though the strands would separate from the scalp with each tug. Neatly trimmed nails grazed lightly over the edges of his face, but Newt focussed on the sensation of the heavy weight against his tongue, the way that every inch he sucked into his mouth felt all the more satisfying as, despite being the one on his knees, he was the one in control at this particular moment in time. It was an oddly heady feeling and one that he relished. Newt was rarely one to simply wait around passively whilst things happened to him or around him, he liked to be active, involved and as much as being tied felt good in a way he couldn’t explain, the struggle to do more was almost as satisfying as the lack of manoeuvrability. This was one thing he could do whilst still being in the somewhat submissive position he preferred. Having control by allowing the other person to think they were in charge. Gellert may have proven himself an impressive individual in many other ways, but Newt prided himself on the things he knew he was good at, even if they weren’t as evident or advertised as the psychiatrist’s talents.

And this, _this_ was one of the things Newt was good at. 

“Such a sweet mouth…you’re just full of surprises, aren’t you? Mano mielasis.”

Newt smiled around the cock in his mouth at the exhaled words and began to bob his head, feeling the head of Gellert’s cock touching the back of his throat with each lunge and whilst he choked a little to begin with – a bit out of practice after so long – he quickly adjusted by relaxing his throat and focussing on the task at hand. One hand drifted up habitually to rest on Gellert’s bare hip, feeling the jut of his hip and massaging the crest of the other man’s arse, fingers massaging for want of something to do other than remain awkwardly clenched at his sides. He dug his fingers in deeper, however, when he became dissatisfied by how controlled Gellert was remaining; he had to admit that there was a part of him that revelled in the idea of the perfect, controlled exterior cracking to show what Newt suspected might be beneath. He was rewarded by Gellert pulling back abruptly, startling Newt momentarily before he was pulled around by the grip the doctor had on his hair. Newt hissing in pain as his head was angled to rest against the edge of the mattress, his knees awkwardly splayed beneath him now as Gellert took charge, thrusting for the first time and controlling the pace, amping it up to one that was practically brutal as Newt just focussed on how to breathe.

Newt took back just a little control as the curve of Gellert’s cock and the sudden increase in pace alerted him to the inevitable climax and took the man that bit deeper, gripping onto the older man’s hips with both hands and shuddering as he swallowed down everything Gellert gave him. He withdrew, panting and almost as spent as the man above him, his head thumping back against the mattress edge and resting there, eyes closed and mouth open and he licked the remnants of release from slightly swollen lips. Newt simply focussed on catching his breath and soothing his hammering heart for a little while. His eyes drifted open a few seconds later as Gellert’s thumb came to gently rub a smear away from his cheek, a mirror of the gesture he’s done back at the restaurant and Newt smiled hazily, tilting his head into the touch and nipping lightly at the doctor’s thumb. Gellert’s face was flushed, posture more relaxed after the release but his still half-hard cock and the glint in his mismatched eyes hinted that the night was far from over. Newt’s own arousal, for instance, was still at its peak, his cock aching between his thighs and body still thrumming with adrenaline and need. 

It was, of course, at that wonderful, uncontrolled, peaking moment…that they both heard the sound of the doorbell ringing downstairs. Newt fought the absurd urge to either laugh or groan in irritation as he was denied a release of his own when Gellert stepped back, gathering his trousers and slipping them on quickly, efficiently and dressing with a speed that belied his previously relaxed post-orgasm posture.

“Expecting someone?” Newt asked, an eyebrow arched and Gellert shook his head as he slipped on a fresh shirt and jacket from the nearby wardrobe, somehow making the ‘caught-in-the-act-dressing-scramble’ look like a runway routine.

“No,” Gellert replied, irritation colouring his tone but Newt could tell that it was more aimed at the unexpected visitor than him so scrambled to his feet, casting his gaze about for his own clothes before releasing that half of them were still downstairs. Gellert caught Newt’s arm as he went for his discarded underwear, however, guiding him back towards the bed where Newt obediently sat and putting one gentle hand against the younger man’s chest to signal for him to stay put. The gaze that held his own was firm and reassuring and though the familiarity of the situation stung a little something in the back of Newt’s eyes, he felt almost liquid and at ease as Gellert finished dressing and moved back towards the door. “I shan’t be long.”

“I should hope not. It’s rather cold in here all of a sudden.” Newt half-laughed and Gellert offered him a thin smile before throwing an embroidered brocade robe to him from where it had been hanging on the back of the bedroom door. Newt caught it half-heartedly with one hand and held it in his lap until the older man left the room, the sound of soft footsteps descending the stairs following before there was silence. He ended up wrapping the robe around him more out of a need for the comfort of something embracing him rather than any particular chill though he couldn’t deny that what he had said was true. The room suddenly did feel much colder without the heat and energy of their activities and the somewhat overbearing presence of the house’s occupant.

It was only when he heard a familiar voice issuing from downstairs alongside Gellert’s that he was tempted to investigate further.

* * *

Detective Inspector Percival Graves was having an ultimately shitty night until the break he had been waiting for finally arrived. Though it most definitely didn’t come in the way he had been expecting it to. He had been following up on another stop on his seemingly never-ending list of places he suspected that a cannibalistic serial killer with absurdly refined tastes might go when he finally caught said break. He had been scoping out the richer areas of the city for the nineteen days he’d been there, checking out every single place that might appeal to the pattern of tastes that he’d established the White Spider to have over the years he’d hunted him. Both in terms of a dietary palate and the nearly as depraved sexual appetites. Whilst the man definitely preferred stalking, butchering and consuming his own meals – thus the very reason Graves was hunting him – the Spider also liked to indulge his narcissistic tendencies by showboating at every opportunity in public, boasting his own intellectual prowess and often whatever poor fools were drawn into his circle of socialites or worse, his dinner table.

Graves knew who the Spider was, of course; had done for nearing four years now, but that didn’t mean that anyone – not even the people whom Graves had once trusted and respected above all else – believed him. The bastard was slippery, manipulative and had attempted to frame Graves for every bloody murder he’d committed whilst in New York. It had only been the benevolence of an anonymous tip-off to Captain Picquery that had ended up saving Graves from losing his job and some serious jail-time. He still didn’t know who had sent the evidence in to clear his name but he had long ago added it to the list of things he needed to investigate. Gellert Grindelwald was his priority. The bastard who’d gutted him, left him for dead and framed him to boot. He didn’t think it was an accident that had brought him back to Dublin in his search for the murderer, no, Graves had a strong suspicion that it was a deliberate move by the cannibal – to make this personal, to distract him somehow. But Graves hadn’t allowed the fact that he was on home-soil distract him from what needed to be done. The only thing that had proved to be a distraction thus far had in fact been the poorly planned booty call with Harkaway. But then again, it had been said booty-call that had led him to meet the student’s friend. Newt. The one who’d caught his attention and indirectly led him to notice Grindelwald leaving the club opposite where Graves had been searching.

He’d been sat out on his Harley, frickin’ freezing his ass off and nursing a potent brew of coffee and scotch that warmed his insides but didn’t throw him off his task too much – not when he’d been drinking this religiously for this long in his life. The red hair had been what drew his attention, the flash of bright hair and pale skin, the cut of familiar eyes and cheekbones that drew his attention about as much as the familiar white-blonde and creepy-as-fuck eyed man who accompanied him. There had been a moment, a temptation when he had wanted to go over and deck the creepy, carnivorous son-of-a-bitch. To beat him into the ground simply for the fact that he’d found way – _yet another_ way – that he could get to Graves, even now. After all this time. There was a part of him that knew Grindelwald always would. That was just the way he fucking was, wasn’t it? The sadistic, egomaniacal, painfully patient little prick. 

He’d spotted his target across the street with Newt from his covert position and had watched on in disbelief as they seemed to engage in an argument of sorts, the younger man sliding out of the cannibal’s grip and showing that familiar fire he’d directed at Graves the first and only time they’d met but it softened much more quickly than Graves might’ve either expected or liked. He hadn’t heard the specifics of the conversation but it had grown progressively more intimate if the touches and looks exchanged were any sufficient indication. The kiss had Graves shifting in agitation, recognising that something else was going on than he had initially suspected. This wasn’t a simple case of Grindelwald picking out his next meal from the ready pool of men foolish or unlucky enough to drift into the Spider’s web, no, this was something else entirely. Grindelwald didn’t _do_ kissing. He didn’t do attachment or courtship or anything real, he did just enough to either satiate his own desires or to draw in the prey. The kissing was something that was far out of the usual repertoire of the murdering bastard and it had Graves concerned all over again that Grindelwald was onto him and knew about his trysts with Harkaway. The student was a bit of an idiot but he didn’t deserve being dragged into the Spider’s schemes and neither did his friend.

When Newt got into the psychopath’s car, however, Graves knew he had to follow. He did so at a covert distance and was rewarded with finding what it seemed was Grindelwald’s current digs – a big, fancy place on the quieter side of town. He parked up not far away and waited. He didn’t entirely know what he was waiting for but after just over an hour of considering every horrendous thing that could be happening to the oblivious young man inside, Graves finally gave in, gritted his teeth, shucked his leather jacket, straightened his shirt and tie and went up to ring the bell. It was another three minutes of waiting before he came face to face with the bastard responsible for ruining not only his life but countless others and he _smiled._ Graves couldn’t help it, he smiled. It was a bitter, twisted and thoroughly forced thing but it nearly split his lips trying all the same. “Long time,”

“No see…” Grindelwald finished slowly, one hand on the door, clearly deciding whether or not to invite him in before his shoulders barely shrugged under the dark blue and purple tweed jacket and he stepped aside, lowering his arm to let the detective in with a bemused expression upon his face. Graves entered, forcing himself to remain amicable for the purposes of not further endangering the innocent who still remained somewhere within this house. He didn’t allow more than a second before he turned to face Grindelwald once more, not following him further than the hallway despite the man clearly directing him towards the kitchen area. Like hell that was gonna happen. 

Graves didn’t remove his hands from where he’d shoved them deep into his pockets to ward off the night’s chill, keeping a grip on his gun in a way that left him the barest trace of comfort when prematurely facing down the single most dangerous man he’d ever met. Instead, he plastered on possibly the fakest smile he’d ever produced and noted the cannibal’s uncharacteristically flushed and slightly dishevelled state. Graves cast his gaze about for any sign of the kid Grindelwald had lured into his lair and did not feel at all encouraged as no sign presented itself.

“As much as I’m delighted you finally decided to visit, Detective Inspector Graves, I’ll admit you have me at a disadvantage,” Grindelwald said smoothly, head tilting to one side slightly as if in deference even though both knew the man wasn’t capable of such a sentiment. “I was not expecting guests this evening.” His eyes narrowed infinitesimally, “Most especially not one of your…” he trailed off delicately, sniffing slightly before finishing in a way that made the word sound almost dirty. “…calibre.”

“I’ll bet,” Graves replied with a dry smile before looking towards the stairs and rest of the doorways rather pointedly “Nice place you got here, must be murder affording the bills.”

Grindelwald shot him an unimpressed look before his gaze too slid towards the stairs and Graves didn’t feign ignorance this time. “You’ve got company.”

“I do, and I was hoping to continue entertaining that company as I see fit.” Grindelwald’s gaze bored into him in that particular way of his – the way that implied he was plumbing the very depths of your soul and figuring out everything that had ever or would ever go through your head.

Graves stared resolutely back. He wasn’t entirely sure what his end game here but he sure as hell wasn’t going to leave Jared’s self-righteous and seemingly well-meaning mate to be killed and eaten by the sadistic nutjob before him. Suspended from the police force and way out of his jurisdiction or not, Graves had his morals. And oddly enough, allowing cannibalism and brutal murder was not something he counted as being particularly moral.

The only problem was that he wasn’t entirely sure how he could get the lad out of there without coming off like a crazy person. Newt sure as hell wasn’t going to trust the hard-drinking, selfish asshole cop that he’d met the other night over the suave, manipulative, charismatic gentleman that Graves knew Grindelwald could be when he wanted to. Even most of the people on the force he had known and trusted for years hadn’t believed him about Grindelwald. Why would Newt? And where the hell _was_ he for that matter? Was Graves too late? Had he waited too long? Maybe he shouldn’t have relied on the idea that Grindelwald would take his time as he usually did. Who knew how long this...association had been going on already? 

Graves' curiosity was answered moments later, however, as he heard the soft padding of bare footsteps on wooden floorboards and glanced instinctively up the stairs just in time to catch a glimpse of a slash of a pale, freckled face, messy copper curls and what looked like one of Grindelwald’s dressing gowns. The fancy pattern on expensive material gave that away pretty clearly. And very much different from the gold and blue ensemble he’d been wearing earlier. He looked paler than before, virtually drained and Graves’ dark eyes began instinctively scanning the young man over for wounds of any kind, seeing nothing obvious but also noticing that Newt’s pupils were blown abnormally wide and his skin was glistening with a light sheen of sweat. Though that could easily be from whatever he and Grindelwald had been doing before Graves arrived rather than any obvious foul play. Though Graves wouldn’t put it past Grindelwald for it to be both.

Dammnit, the lad was in deeper than he’d expected.

He caught said lad’s eye as he peeked back around the corner again, looking for all the world like a child caught up past his bedtime spying on his parents whilst they argued. But that flash of innocence was gone in the next moment, vanished as Newt made his way down the stairs, staring at both of them but most especially Graves. “What are you doing here?” Graves cocked his head, not entirely sure how to answer that but Newt seemed somewhat incensed as he came down the stairs, demanding, “Are you following me?”

Grindelwald was looking between the two of them with new interest and Graves could’ve punched something as the murderer asked, “You know one another?”

“Barely,” Newt replied, padding to stand on the bottommost step, nearer to Grindelwald than to Graves, setting a clear and – to Newt, at least - sensible preference. The Brit was frowning at Graves with an indirect sort of affront that told Graves he was thoroughly suspicious of anything that he would have to say. Shame he hadn’t reserved that same level of hostility and suspicion for the man he was apparently fucking. “How do _you_ know him?”

“An old colleague of mine from when I had the pleasure of working in New York,” Grindelwald supplied smoothly, unperturbed as ever but with a glint in his eyes that Graves knew spelt trouble for both of them. Deciding to play his cards close to his chest, for now, Graves nodded when Newt looked to him for acknowledgement and whilst the younger man’s eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly, he seemed to take the answer for its face value.

“Colleague?” Newt probed and here Graves couldn’t resist cutting in with a tight smile.

“I happened to need the opinion of a skilled surgeon on one of my cases and the department brought in Dr Grindelwald as a consultant of sorts.” Grindelwald inclined his head slightly in agreement to Graves’ summation but the detective smiled grimly at the other man as he continued, “Rather nasty murders going on at the time. Young men being skinned, their organs being ripped out willy nilly. Sick bastard was even making cocoons out of their treated skin to keep everything in after he’d taken the bits that took his fancy.”

“If I remember correctly, I don’t believe that the organs were taken at random. As you said, it was the work of a skilled hand and it was unsurprising you came to seek a professional’s opinion,” came the reply, the man’s ego as obvious as ever to anyone with half a brain. Maybe the bitterness was making him harsher than he used to be but seeing another victim waiting to happen growing so close to Grindelwald – least of all someone he knew and grudgingly respected…it was difficult to say the least. 

Newt looked rather nonplussed at the interaction, his arms still folded seemingly protectively over the borrowed dressing gown, the garment hanging loosely on his slim frame but a bit shorter than it would’ve been on Grindelwald, only going about mid-calf and lending a further air of vulnerability to the younger man. Graves found himself wondering just how the lad had ended up on Grindelwald’s radar. Looking between the two men, he thought it couldn’t hurt to ask. “So how’d you two get to be knocking boots?”

He inwardly smirked at the way Grindelwald’s lip curled in distaste at the phrasing but also cringed a little too as Newt bristled. It was Grindelwald who answered, with less venom than he might’ve expected. “A flight of chance. But I am more interested in what brought you to Dublin. Let alone to my home this late at night?”

It was a clear challenge and Graves was quick to offer him a hard look in return, “Well, I feel that your expertise may be needed again. Same case as before actually. Odd luck that I should hear you’re in the city just when I’d need a keen surgeon’s eye, eh?”

Grindelwald’s expression betrayed nothing. “Quite. But forgive me, Inspector Graves, I was under the impression that that particular case had been passed along to one of your colleagues in London?”

Graves didn’t miss the way that Newt’s eyes narrowed very slightly, brows furrowing at the words and he stowed the information away in his brain for later reference before answering Grindelwald’s thinly-veiled dig. “Working in a sort of partnership, actually. It’s usually an all hands on deck kinda thing when you get someone this demented preying on innocent folk like this.”

“Understandable, though it still does not explain why you chose to visit quite so late.”

“Eh, didn’t get into the country all that long ago, time difference messed up my head and all that, s’pose,” Graves countered flippantly, gaze taking in both men before him with practised nonchalance whilst still detecting whatever he could. Any signs of what was going on or what might soon. He looked quite deliberately to Newt, momentarily ignoring Grindelwald as he asked, “And what brings _you_ here so late at night? Work’s my excuse, what’s yours, cider boy?”

He could feel Grindelwald’s eyes on him but ignored it in wake of Newt’s answer which came as a firm, “I don’t see how it’s any of your business, Inspector Graves, but if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll be leaving.” He glanced sideways at Grindelwald whose attention was fixed solely on Newt now too. “I’ll just go get changed.”

Without another word, Newt was heading up the stairs with a speed and grace that astonished Graves, the younger man only pausing to duck into a side room, returning with an armful of clothing and flushing furiously before he was off again. There was the sound of a door closing upstairs and then silence. After some time, Grindelwald sighed and it was a sound that cut through the air like a knife. It was equal parts exasperation and something akin to satisfaction and Graves tightened his grip on his gun in his pocket in anticipation of what might come next.

“That was terribly rude of you, Graves.”

“So sorry to ruin your night,” Graves smiled, brittle but with more genuine sentiment behind it than before.

“You will be,” came the simple response and Graves let the smile drop, eyes narrowing in on the way Grindelwald’s expression had hardened once more now that the need to act had left the room. Here was the real Grindelwald, if but a glimpse.

“There he is,” Graves said, gaze steadier than his hand, “Just who I came to see.”

“Not young Newton, then?”

“No, tonight was going to be all about you until I saw you had dinner to go.”

Grindelwald’s lip curled and his eyes flashed beneath the calm façade, “Well, I’ll admit that I was not aware you knew one another. How did that truly come about, I wonder? Have you been doing your research more thoroughly than before, dear detective?”

“Can’t say I know what you’re on about there, but whatever you’re up to, I’m giving you due warning that I intend to stop it.”

“So there are some manners in you, after all. I thank you for your candour. I might just refrain from digging about under your layers to see what else I might find.”

The scar lying heavy upon Graves’ gut twinged seemingly in response to the reminder and he twitched a grimacing smile as he heard the sound of footsteps across the landing above them once more, “Much obliged.”

Newt came down the stairs almost as quickly as he’d ascended them, hastily dressed, still pale and sweating and with his coat stuffed carelessly under one arm, sand, inexplicably seeping from one pocket and onto Grindelwald’s immaculately clean floor. It was perhaps a testament to how well the man was playing his role as he didn’t even look down, instead watching Newt with suddenly softer eyes, briefly catching the Brit’s arm as he was about to shut the front door behind him. “Newt, don’t feel the need to leave on Inspector Graves’ account, he will not be staying long and we can continue with our evening as planned.”

Wide, pupil-blown eyes stared back at Grindelwald for a few moments before they flickered over to Graves, unfathomable, and then back to the blonde, “It’s alright. I’ve got some…thinking to do…I’ll call you.” 

With that, the door closed with a quiet click and both men stood in silence staring at it for a while before Grindelwald’s voice rang out softly through the quiet, “Leave now, Graves. I won’t allow it again.”

Graves was tempted to go in guns blazing for just a few moments before his better sense overrode that instinct and told him that if he did so now, the best outcome would likely be him getting arrested for assault and the worst would be that he’d be gutted, displayed and eaten before dawn came. It wasn’t worth ruining everything he’d worked for just for the potential satisfaction of maybe getting a shot in before Grindelwald beat him. Again.

He left without another word, his eyes practically bugging as he saw Newt leaning against his bike not far outside, just down the street under the cover of the park trees, right where’d be left it. He slowed his frustrated steps and stopped in front of both the boy and the bike with a raised brow and a deep sigh.

“How’d you know it was mine?”

“Jared’s always had a thing for classic bikes and I figured it’d be part of the appeal.”

Graves nodded absently, moving forwards until he was directly in front of the younger man, glancing back down the street, satisfying his paranoia when he saw it empty before turning back to Newt. “Something I can help you with?”

Newt stood, arms folded and coat back on now in wake of the cold night air that puffed each man’s breaths into visible dragon clouds. “Why were you really here? Because I don’t believe for a second that rather ridiculous excuse that Gellert pretended to buy.”

“Call it curiosity.”

“About?”

“Why the hell you’re spending time with a pretentious prig like that?”

Newt blinked, nonplussed and shifted on his feet, properly awkward and uncertain for the first time since Graves had known him. “And who are you to judge who I spend time with? You’re not exactly a-a-a paragon of great life choices from what I’ve seen. You can’t honestly expect me to trust your judgement after seeing what you did to my friend. After clearing up your messes every time you screwed around with him and he pretended that it didn’t matter when it was ripping him up on the inside.”

That got to Graves more than it should have and his tone darkened, “Maybe not, but at least I don’t shack up with the first rich asshole who shows me some attention and then judge everyone else around me from my fucking high-horse!”

He shouldn’t have been surprised when Newt slapped him but it stung, nonetheless and he found himself catching Newt’s arm on the withdrawal by instinct, pushing him back until he was leant against the Harley once more, Graves leant over him and furious face inches from the Brit’s. “Don’t make the same mistake that everyone else did. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that you can trust him. He’s dangerous, Newt, and if you carry on screwing around with him, I cannot be held responsible for what happens to you after tonight.”

“I’m not asking you to be. I barely know you!” Newt shoved him away with surprising force considering his slight frame and hazy state and Graves let himself be pushed, glaring at the younger man but with apprehension gnawing at the scar in his gut in some inexplicable way. 

“True, I guess that makes sense but I-” he cut himself off forcibly before he said something that would likely get Newt killed. “I’m sorry, but I just want you to know that people have a bad habit of ending up hurt around him and I’d hate for you to follow that pattern.”

Newt regarded him for some time before he was then stepping around the bike and out onto the curb with quick, stumbling steps that nearly had Newt on his arse as his feet tangled slightly beneath him. Before Graves could attempt to right him, however, Newt was backing down the street once more and Percival held up his hands in surrender to the younger man’s wishes.

“Alright, alright. Again, I’m sorry. I’ll leave you alone.”

“See that you do,” Newt replied but there was no real force behind the words, so little, in fact, that Graves found himself smiling after the young man, pausing before calling out.

“You sure you don’t want a lift somewhere?”

“Quite sure!” came the called response.

Graves slung his leg over the back of the Harley, coaxing her to roar to life and riding down the street after the despondent Zoologist who was now digging in his coat pocket, taking out his phone and scrolling through it with a seemingly particular purpose. Newt froze mid-stride and Graves was forced to brake harder than he had been accelerating and was jolted to a stop beside the young man. He looked on in concern. “What is it?”

Newt ignored him and continued walking, faster than before and with an evidently perturbed expression marring his angular face. It wasn’t until Percival literally pulled the motorcycle up onto the pavement in front of Newt that the man stopped, staring at him, askance from his phone, lowering to rest it at his side and Graves blurted out the first thing that came into his head. “Do you want to go dancing some time?”

Newt stared at him for nearly a full thirty seconds before he blurted out a thoroughly appropriate, “ _What?_ ” 


	10. Can't you hear it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I warned that this one was a slow burn and I meant it

**Chapter 10**

**Can’t you hear it?**

“What?”

“You said that already,” Graves pointed out and Newt sent him a withering look, running a hand through his already tousled hair and sighed, scrubbing that same hand over his face vigorously, as if he were trying to rid himself of something. Some ache or injury that he couldn’t seem to shake. Standing this close to the younger man, he could see a slight puffiness to his lips and could smell the metallic sweat and slight saltiness of what had been going on between him and Grindelwald only minutes before. But looking at Newt now, he did not seem to be a man sated – not in the way Grindelwald had evidently been. Whatever Graves had interrupted had caught the two before Newt had got his release and he couldn’t help but feel a touch guilty at giving the poor guy blue-balls even if it’d probably saved him from a much worse fate. For now, at least. Now, he just had to deal with the lad staring at him like he was a lunatic.

“So sorry for the repetition but I find myself wondering why on earth you would ask that?”

It was a fair question and Graves found himself unable to answer as he too ran a hand over the stubble at the back of his head, almost as uncertain as the young man before him. Eventually, he blurted out the first thing that came to his mind, probably not a great idea considering where that had got him mere moments before.

“It sounds like fun.”

“Fun,” Newt repeated the word like it was foreign to him before attempting to sidestep around both Graves and his bike, clearly wanting to get home and Graves sighed, catching Newt by the arm and expounding.

“I feel like I owe you an apology and this seems like a decent enough way of offering it, don’t you think?”

“Not really,” came the unsurprisingly frank reply and Newt slipped out of his grip, continuing his determined journey along the middle of the deserted road, pulling his coat tighter to him as obvious shivers wracked his thin form. Graves turned his bike and followed alongside at a sedate pace, watching the student until he finally looked up at him, not stopping but glancing in Graves’ vague direction. “I’m guessing there’s no use in telling you to bugger off and leave me alone, is there?”

Graves shot him a grin, “I’m afraid there isn’t.”

“And if I were to call the police on you, they would most likely take your side, wouldn’t they?”

Graves cringed inwardly as he realised how he must be coming off and deliberately swerved the bike to run a line slightly further away from the lad even as he continued driving alongside him. He didn’t feel that mentioning he was both suspended and out of his jurisdiction would help matters and so kept mum on the matter, instead offering a quiet, “Perhaps, but I was hoping it wouldn’t come to that.”

“And I was hoping to spend my evening very differently from how it turned out. We can’t all get what we want, now can we?”

“Well, I don’t know about that, Grindelwald seems to have been doing a fair job of it up until now.”

“What problem do you have with him exactly?”

Graves snorted despite himself, “We have history.”

That seemed to bring Newt up short and he stared for a few moments before Graves realised how his words had sounded to the untrained ear. “Oh no, _god_ _no_ , not like that.”

“Oh…right, well then,” Newt only seemed marginally relieved but carried on walking, his pace steady but not challenging his tail at all by ducking off into one of the numerous alleyways, park gates or other areas that he would’ve struggled to get his Harley through.

Graves took that as slight encouragement and watched the lad a little longer, feeling a little of his old self slip back to the forefront, even for just a moment as he ventured, “You want to know more about this miraculous man you’re spending your time with but you’re worried he won’t tell you the truth if you ask him half of what’s on your mind.” 

Newt’s brows furrowed and he shot Graves another look, “Maybe, but I’m not exactly certain that I could trust your aspersions on the matter either.”

“I’ve known him longer than you. Years longer, and I guarantee you, you’ll regret getting in too deep with him.”

“Opinion noted, now if you’ll excuse me, I would really rather be getting home at some point before dawn,” Newt replied, digging his hands into his pockets and quickening his step. 

“You have flatmates that’ll miss you?”

Newt glanced back over his shoulder and shot him a bitter smile, “Yes, actually I do.” He tilted his head a fraction, “And by the way, Detective Graves, for someone who seems so intent on warning me off peculiar strangers, you’re not exactly coming off entirely well-balanced yourself.” 

“At least you’re admitting he’s a stranger. And a strange one too,” Graves called back. “I’ll take what I can get at this point.” He quirked a dark eyebrow and the grin turned hopeful, “And would that also happen to include you agreeing to my earlier request?”

“Not a chance, I’m afraid!” came the forcibly chipper reply and this time, Graves didn’t attempt to follow as the young man crossed the street and slipped into an alley between a closed café and a deli, disappearing off down a route that Graves couldn’t easily follow. He was tempted to go after him, to escort him back home and make sure that no psychopathic creeps got their claws into him again but he knew that any attempts at keeping tabs on Newt would likely result in more difficulty and possibly a restraining order being levied against him. He didn’t need any more attention on him when he was already in hot water for continuing an investigation that he’d been officially kicked off years before. He knew for a fact that if Picquery heard about what he was doing, he’d be in jail before Grindelwald could ever get to him. Speaking of which, he wasn’t entirely sure why Grindelwald had let him leave just now but he got the feeling that it was less to do with mercy and probably more to do with the suspicion that’d be drawn onto him should Graves turn up dead after the last place he’d been seen alive was the killer’s doorstep. Then again, Newt was the only witness to potentially attest to that and he guessed that as they were both still alive, Grindelwald likely had bigger plans for both of them. Graves just had to try to find a way of proving what the man really was before that happened.

Easier said than done.

He’d been years behind the man’s schemes for as long as he’d been trying to catch him. The initial time that he’d known the surgeon, he’d been under the misguided impression that Grindelwald was _helping_ him – not committing the very murders he was trying to solve. Now, however, he was at least more aware than he ever had been before and also had a gauge of at least who was the man’s next victim. Whatever Grindelwald’s interest was in seducing Newt, Graves knew that his best shot was getting closer to the lad so that he might be able to intercept whatever Grindelwald had planned. Unfortunately, that might prove bloody difficult after the two encounters he’d had so far with the young man and the one person he might be able to go to to ask about Newt was Jared. He couldn’t imagine a scenario where asking Harkaway about his best friend would not result in Graves getting a broken nose – not after how they’d left things.

Graves might no longer be the most reliable or sensitive person when it came to hook-ups, but that didn’t mean he wanted to play either Harkaway or his friend. They were decent folk and Graves didn’t want to hurt either student. But if he was going to get ahead of Grindelwald’s schemes, he might just have to. There was a time when he had the respect and trust of nearly everyone around him – when he leant into the parts of him that were strong and stern, the parts that Picquery had once called noble. But the years of being discredited, mistrusted, shunned and called a crazy hack had taken their toll, as had the drink he’d turned to just to take the edge off it all. There was a time when all of this would have been easier, when he could get what he wanted and where he wanted with a couple of brisk words and astute observations, occasionally softened by a kinder edge. But doing that now, after everything that had happened…it felt weak and hollow. He didn’t have it in him to fake the air of authority and grace that he might once’ve had. 

With a deep sigh, Graves let his Harley idle by the roadside as he dug out his phone, rapping out a text to Jared and feeling a leaden weight settle in his gut as he received a response less than a minute later.

God, this was gonna be rough. 

* * *

It took him over an hour to walk home, his somewhat sluggish body feeling as though he was forcing it through a thick sheet of plastic with nearly every step towards the end, his head heavy and heart somewhat despondent after yet another utterly bizarre night. There was a part of him that was concerned by the fact that in the week or more around meeting Gellert, nothing but odd and frankly disturbing things had been happening to him. That part was the same one that encouraged him to listen to Graves, the part that had slowed his steps and somewhat allowed the detective to speak even as the larger part of him wanted nothing more than to ignore him and go back to Gellert’s house. He wanted to give in and curl up in the man’s arms, maybe get some release while he was at it and not crawl out of that frankly inviting bed for the rest of the weekend.

However, as Newt fumbled his keys out and entered his blissfully warm and human-free flat, he knew he’d made the right call by leaving. Even if it had left him with a rather distressing and disappointing set of blue balls in the process. His arousal had waned pretty much the moment he’d peeked around the corner of the stairs and spied Graves and Gellert glaring at each other in the hallway. The similar circumstances to what had happened with Albus years before, the lingering fear of abandonment…it had all worked in a way that had his head swimming and limbs feeling clumsy enough to successfully derail the night.

He chugged down some water and paracetamol in a routine that hadn’t really stopped since the brick incident and stripped off, heading to bed without bothering with pyjamas. Unfortunately for Newt, the missed calls and texts left on his phone would not let him sleep. He sighed, retrieving his phone again and staring at the blazingly bright screen in the dark of his room, feeling the warm furry weight of a cat settle on his feet as he scrolled over to open the voicemails left for him. The first was from his brother, he huffed before clicking on it, there was the customary click and beep before-

_Hey Newt, just called to let you know I’m going to be in Dublin next week so thought we should grab lunch at some point when you’re free. Text me when you get this and I’ll make the reservations._

Newt sighed, tapping off the message and letting Theseus know when he’d be free and sending it before he realised that it was nearing one in the morning and that he’d probably get berated later for responding so late. He pushed it from his mind and tapped on the next voicemail with significantly more apprehension as he saw the familiar little AD tag next to the notification.

_Newt, please call me at your earliest convenience. This is a conversation that warrants a phone call at the very least, as we cannot speak face-to-face. As much as I appreciate you may be preoccupied with other affairs at the moment, I find myself needing the reassurance of hearing your voice once more._

It was a short message and Newt was left staring at his phone for minutes after, the screen blurring underneath his stinging, heavy eyes until he let out a groan and buried his face into his pillow, letting the phone slip from his fingers to be left somewhere in the folds of his duvet. _What was going_ on _in his life right now?_

When he woke, he was confused because it was still dark. He was about to roll over and try to go back to sleep when Lila began rubbing her head into his hand where it was draped over the side of the bed and he moaned slightly, drawing back the hand, scrubbing it over and his face and stiffly trying to get himself upright. The effort proved too difficult by far, however, as his head spun and he fell back into the pillows with an inarticulate noise of distress, curling in on himself. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this hungover…or how on earth he’d managed to get a hangover this bad from only two drinks on a full stomach. It didn’t make any sense. Maybe he was coming down with something. Come to think of it, he did feel almost feverish, achy and sore all over too, the pounding in his skull like nothing else. Typical luck that he managed to get ill now of all times.

He only attempted to move when the burning of thirst in his throat grew too strong what felt like an eternity later and he managed to finally roll himself up and staggered, ungainly, across the room and into the kitchen, forgoing a cup as he jammed his head under the faucet and drank straight from the tap. Getting upright afterwards nearly had him on the floor and he was forced to settle at the kitchen table for a time, face and hair dripping cold water down his bare back and pounding head in his hands. He drifted a bit in the refuge of his closed eyelids, not getting up again but shifting every now and again when the ache in his back and shoulders flared anew, eventually deciding that the floor seemed a good a place as any to rest and slid off the chair to rest his overly warm face against the cool linoleum.

This time, he dreamt. He dreamt of soft, rich voices speaking to him, hushing him when he grew too distressed, lying on the slab of ice as he was. He dreamt of lingering touches that brushed his hair back from his face and trailed over his neck, resting there to feel the thrum of his heart and soothing him again with wordless humming when he tried to move once more. It wasn’t like he was trying to move away though, no, he wanted more of those nice warm hands against his ice-bitten flesh. He liked those hands. That rich, quiet, soothing voice...he wanted them badly. They went away again though, the voice and the hands, drowned and drawn away by familiar screeching and loud bangs. Harsh sounds that sent Newt away again. Back to slip under the ice.

Newt was coaxed to the reality of his situation hours later, body blazing with aches, pains and general horrendous discomfort by the feeling of claws scratching his bare side and a cacophony of irritated feline and bird sounds. The Zoologist managed to stagger up, going into the reflexive routine of care for every single one of the clamouring creatures in his flat, even managing to properly peel his eyelids open to open up the terrariums for Pickett and his reptilian brethren. The irritated pecks he received from Arry and Lisbet when he opened their cages to check in on them and let them stretch their wings were probably deserved but he figured that a couple extra hours of sleep couldn’t really hurt when he was feeling this absolutely rotten. The only creatures in his flat that openly demanded frequent attention were the mammals that roamed free and when Newt settled himself sorely and exhaustedly onto his bed maybe fifteen minutes later, the cats and the fox all settled around him, contented and seemingly forgiving as they burrowed against him. All except for Monty who decided to rest squarely on Newt’s aching, shivering, sweat-tinged back. He fell asleep quicker than before to the comforting sounds, smells and feel of his friends taking care of him in the only ways that they had to offer. 

Newt must’ve passed out a while longer because when he awoke, it was to the insistent hammering on his door and whilst his mouth felt irreversibly dry and his head still throbbed with each beat of his heart, he could see somewhat straight again and when he stood – thankfully not dislodging too many friends as he did so - he made it over to the front door without too much trouble. He’d barely got it unlatched, however, when he was enveloped in a flurry of overbearing Americans so quickly that he barely had time to properly register either their entry or the fact that he was only standing there in his pants and socks as Queenie and Jared bustled past him into the flat, startling Helga nearly as much as the Zoologist.

“What-…what’re the two of you doing here?” the words were slurred, interspersed with a dry cough or two and Newt barely managed them past the horrible feeling in his throat, he stumbled over to the fridge and pulled out a carton of orange juice, chugging down everything that was left before dropping it in the recycling without a second thought. When he turned back to his visitors, both were standing by the kitchen archway and staring at him with open concern.

“You okay there, buddy?” Jared asked, tone tight as Newt sat back down at the table with a heavy exhale.

“M’fine, just…came down with something…now what are you doing here?”

“We came to check on you, sweetie,” Queenie told him. “We were worried.”

“Why?”

“Well, we hadn’t heard from you in so long and-”

Newt sighed. “I texted you yesterday, Queenie and Jared…it’s not like we keep in contact on a daily basis anyway so-”

He cut off as he saw the look of increased concern that both exchanged and asked slowly, “What?”

Queenie came forward and sat at the chair next to him with an impressive fragility as she gently placed one hand on his arm in what he supposed was meant to be a comforting manner, “Newt, honey, it’s been two days. You missed two last-minute shifts at work and weren’t answering anyone’s calls. Fiennes was furious cause he had to bring in Billy and you know he hates how much that guy just flits around all the time. And then Jared told me he hadn’t heard from you either…what the heck happened?”

“You look like shit, Newt,” Jared chimed in with an assertive and entirely unhelpful nod.

“Thanks…” Newt murmured reflexively before looking to Queenie again, “What do you mean two days? What day is it?”

“Sunday. Sunday night, that is,” Queenie told him and Newt’s eyes bugged. How the hell had he lost all that time?? Maybe he was sicker than he’d thought. He sank further into his chair and rested his head upon the table, nausea taking root in his stomach all of a sudden.

“I don’t feel very well,” he half-moaned and jolted when he felt Queenie’s slender fingers card through his hair but didn’t attempt to move away from them.

“You sure you don’t want to go see a doctor?”

Newt laughed at the arguable irony of the question even as he shook his head, “No, definitely not.”

“Newt, what happened to you?”

“Nothing, nothing ‘happened’ to me, I just…I think I had rather too much to drink and it hit me harder than it usually might’ve.”

“Drink? Who’re you drinking with?” Jared asked, seeming almost indignant – probably because Newt hadn’t been drinking with him.

“Was it that guy you were talking about before?”

Newt’s silence seemed to be all the answer either of them needed and Queenie tutted. “Newt! That’s great but I wish you would just tell us if you’re planning to have a crazy sex weekend with your new boyfriend. It wouldn’t kill you to call.”

“That- that was most definitely _not_ what happened.” Newt floundered, “I got home on Friday night and spent the next few days at home.”

“Then why didn’t you contact either of us all weekend?”

Newt hesitated and when he finally looked up again it was to receive a long, woolly jumper in the face as Jared threw it at him from where it’d been lying unnoticed on Newt’s bed. Newt shrugged the jumper on, realising for the first time how cold he was. The heating was on, of course, but the weird, feverish feeling remained deep in his bones and the jumper helped it a bit, as did the paper cup of slightly-hotter-than-tepid tea that was pressed into his hand by Queenie. There was also a paper bag sitting on the table that Queenie pushed toward him with a sympathetic smile, Newt opened it and offered a grateful, rueful grin of his own as he saw it was two of Jacob’s famous Paczkis.

“He said he owed you one every day until he’s paid you back,” Queenie smiled at him and Newt obligingly took a bite of it, smiling around the pastry even as the sweetness after so long not eating made him feel a little ill. He soldiered through it between sips of tea as his friends – human and animal alike - settled around him and by the end of the first pastry, the sick feeling had lessened a bit along with the light-headedness. He hadn’t realised how hungry he’d been until he finally ate something. He demolished the second Paczki much quicker and his brain felt even less fuzzy after that. He supposed that not eating anything in two days was likely to do that to a person.

“Thank you for this,” he said, genuinely meaning it and exhaled as Jared patted him on the head in a somewhat patronizing manner.

“Are you sure everything’s okay though, honey, sweetie, darling, baby boy?” Jared asked faux-breathlessly in his timelessly, eerily accurate impression of Queenie, patting Newt’s hair with exaggerated strokes and grinning over at Queenie who promptly thumped him in the arm. The Texan winced, the question was genuine enough even if the delivery had been a bit over-the-top, it helped, though, as they all shared a laugh, breaking a little of the tension that had rested between them.

“Feeling better by the second,” Newt assured them wearily.

He made his way over to his bedroom and managed to scrounge up some trousers, pulling them on to regain just a little bit of dignity and then searched his mussed, sweat-stained bedclothes for his phone. Unsurprisingly, the battery was dead after having been left off charge for so long and he plugged it back in, inwardly cringing at the flurry of missed alarms and notifications he likely had coming his way once it charged up a bit more. Most especially after the last voicemails that he had been conscious to receive – apparently _two bloody days ago_! – had been rather important and one of them being both heart-wrenching and cryptic. And the other having warned him of hurricane Theseus’ imminent arrival. At least one of those things had a clear intent behind it – he knew Theseus was going to do the usual annoying older brother thing and judge his life choices as much as his friends currently were.

When he went back into the kitchen area, Queenie had already started making coffee for her and Jared with a slight look of distaste on her face at the cheapness of the instant coffee granules available and possibly the fact that the milk in Newt’s fridge was out of date. Newt supposed that even for someone who didn’t make coffee for a living, his current kitchen status was a little lacking.

“You need to go shopping sometime soon.”

“I’ll get around to it when everything stops moving whenever I stand,” Newt told her tiredly, head jolting up a few moments later when the first of many beeps issued from where he’d left his phone, the student tried to stand but was hit by the very feeling of dizziness he’d just described and was forced to sit again heavily. Jared took pity on him and went over, unplugging the phone and re-plugging it into one of the kitchen sockets close enough for Newt to reach whilst it continued to charge. 

“Thanks,” he murmured, staring down at his phone and wincing at the eighteen missed calls, texts and voicemails. He thought it’d been bad before…

Most of them had been from Queenie, a fair few from Jared, the aforementioned dreaded calls from Fiennes, a scattering of reminder texts from his brother about a lunch that was now looming the day after next…and three other missed calls. One more from Albus. One from Gellert and one final one from an unknown number. He disregarded the ones from his present friends frowned at the calls. No messages or voicemails left from any of the other three and somehow, he wasn’t surprised – he couldn’t exactly imagine Gellert texting much past necessity and Albus had stopped his rare, scant-worded texts long ago. Both were a bit old fashioned that way. But then again, he supposed that was what he got when he got involved with men nearly two decades his senior.

He looked up to his friends who were talking quietly not far away from him and he stared at them long enough so that they when they glanced back to him Queenie plastered on a bright, fake smile and Jared cocked an inquisitive eyebrow at him. “Get sent anything interesting?”

Newt blinked and put the phone down, “Uh, yes, I suppose. Theseus is in town,” he glanced over at Queenie. “Did you know about this?”

Her blonde brows furrowed, “Oh, yeah, sorry, it was in one of the texts I sent you. Teenie told me Theseus was visiting but that she was staying back in London to look after little Eddie. Apparently, Theseus is here for work or something?”

“Righto, yes, makes sense, I suppose.”

“Anything else?” Jared probed, arms crossed over his battered leather jacket, boots squeaking wetly against the floor as he stepped forwards.

Newt sighed as it felt like something gave in him, the pounding in his skull intensified and he finally spouted, “Yes! Yes, alright. A great deal has happened and I’m not really sure how to cope with most of it if I’m honest and I also very much doubt that telling either of you about any of it is going to help.”

They both looked at him, askance and Queenie slowly sat in the seat next to him and Jared leant back against the countertop but it was Newt who broke the silence, speaking quickly and quietly though with a certain amount of determination all the same. “I appreciate that you’re both trying to help but I feel like every time I’ve seen either of you recently, it's just you doting over me when it’s really not necessary.” He looked between them in a somewhat beseeching manner, “I’d much rather get back to normal if that’s alright? Just talk about normal things and be…normal?”

“Newt-" Queenie cut herself off, chewing on her bottom lip until the pink gloss on it smeared and she seemed to collect herself, smiling over at him with renewed fervour, “So…how’d the date go?”

Newt tilted his head and exhaled briefly before answering, “We went to dinner. The food was delicious. He offered me a job. He asked me back to his house for drinks and-"

“Sorry, what?” Queenie cut in, mouth agape. “He offered you a _job_?

Jared’s grin was absolutely filthy as he leant forward, arms still crossed and leather jacket creaking as he asked in a devilish stage-whisper, “He hire you on as his after-hours secretary? Ooooh, how bout a housemaid who has to wear kinky little costumes? Ah no, what about a grad student who wears nothing but pleated miniskirts and likes have increasingly large things shoved up his-"

By this point, Newt’s face was absolutely crimson, his previous sickly pallor long gone in the wake of the mortification and embarrassing tingles of arousal _those_ suggestions sent through his muddled head and it was all he could do to sputter out denials over Jared’s teasing. “No, no, no, good heavens no! Nothing like that.” He took a deep breath, “Actually, it sounded rather perfect. It’s a role working with the RSPCA and the police. Acting as a liaison of sorts, he said. I’d be helping to bring animal abuse cases straight to the police and would have the legal backing of a well-respected charity to do so.”

Queenie practically trilled, “Newt, that’s amazing, honey!”

Newt ducked his head into a slight nod before he shook his head, not quite despairingly and her face fell with it. “It sounds... _fantastic_ , yes, it really does,” he swallowed and looked up at his friends earnestly. “I’m not sure if getting the job through him is the best idea. He’s been very...kind to me but I-...I haven’t known him for very long. Barely over a week and I’m not sure if accepting this offer when I don’t know all that much about him or the people he works with-" Graves' face flashed before his eyes alongside that of the stranger Rodolfus, and even fleetingly Abernathy's. “I love the sound of this opportunity and I like him very much, I really think there might be something there but...it’s all rather muddled and I’m not terribly certain if it’s a good idea to start unravelling it all right now.”

“Newt...I can understand why you’re nervous, but ain’t this just the sort of opportunity you came here to find? To get a job that suited you and to get away from your past?” the words were coaxing and the tone gentle but there was an intent behind it that seemed almost urgent and Newt looked up from the table to meet Queenie’s green eyes hesitantly, searchingly. He found genuine concern there alongside such bright hope that he couldn’t help but be infected by it and smiled back, albeit a little weakly. Her smile brightened and she reached over to pat his hand gently. “I feel like this mystery guy might just be both those things and it’d seem pretty stupid to just throw that all away cause you’re a little scared of starting something new.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Newt conceded before clearing his throat slightly and straightening to grab two more paracetamol from the nearby blister-pack, popping them out and swallowing with a grimace before adding in a steadier tone, “But I’ve still got a great deal of thinking to do about this and I think it’s probably going to help if I get some fresh air first.”

“Pub?” Jared put in immediately and Newt frowned at him.

“I’m not sure what time it is but I think that whatever the case, it feels too early to be drinking.”

“It’s six, Newt, perfect time.”

“It’s a Sunday, nowhere will be open.”

“It’s a city, there’s always places open.”

“I really don’t feel like it.”

Jared tipped his head sceptically before his bottom lip jutted out petulantly, “Yeah, you do look like you’ve just crawled off the poster of _Night of the Living Dead_ or something.”

Newt wasn’t going to try to argue against a point like that. He certainly felt about as bad. And if it got him out of drinking right now…nope, definitely no arguments here. Instead, he said, “I might go for a walk actually.”

Queenie rolled her eyes, “Are you sure that’s the best idea, if you’re feeling sick still?”

Newt shrugged. “Well, sitting around here isn’t going to help with that. I quite literally slept the weekend away, I want to be out and moving. Doing something.”

“Alright, if you’re sure…” Queenie said, still looking dubious “Let’s go to the park, but put some layers on first, it’s real cold out there.”

“Yes _mum_ ,” Newt half-griped at her and she stuck out her tongue at him. He did as she suggested though, switching out his jumper for a few extra layers and jamming the jumper on overtop with his coat squeezing over the lot. The feverish feeling left in his bones _was_ making it hard to judge whether he was cold or not and he knew that layering up was probably the safest idea so soon after being so sick. The food was sitting heavy in his stomach but he was feeling better than he had before. He guessed the sleep, food, tea and the distractions of his friends’ conversation had helped.

“Mind if I come with?”

Newt looked over at Queenie as he wrapped the new scarf around his neck, taking in familiar traces of scents from the night before, “Of course,” he glanced down rather pointedly at Queenie’s not-particularly-practical hot-pink high-heeled boots and worryingly-white jeans. “Are you sure you’re alright for Phoenix park though? A lot of mud and-”

“It’s fine, not letting you go on your own,” she said bracingly. “You still look awful so it's not ‘doting’ if you look like you’re gonna pass out.”

Newt shrugged, conceding the point as being valid and glanced over at Jared, “You coming too?”

“I’m good, going to the pub anyways sooo…”

“On your own?”

Jared flushed a little, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand in a most un-Jared-like manner, “Ah, no.”

Newt turned away from where he had been going for the door and arched an eyebrow, his back resting against the kitchen archway as he stared his friend down with growing suspicion. “Please don’t tell me you’re going out with Graves again?”

Jared shifted on his feet but met Newt’s stare head-on all the same, “He apologised, Newt. Never heard him do that, and he promised he was sticking round a while longer and asked if he could start spending more time with me. Seems like he’s trying.”

Newt blinked before venturing, “And he didn’t mention why?”

“No, just that he realised he’d been an ass and that he was sorry.”

“Right,” Newt murmured, closing his eyes against the increased throbbing in his skull but he decided that he’d learnt his lesson from the last time he’d put his oar in between Jared and Graves and decided that whatever happened, he would stay out of it unless Graves did something truly reprehensible. Instead, he opened the door to his flat, Queenie heading out first, followed by Jared who looked for all the world like a kicked puppy and Newt sighed, closing the door behind all three of them, locking it and then patting Jared’s shoulder in a rather ineffectual manner, offering him a brief smile. “I hope everything works out alright for you.”

“Me too, buddy.” 

It was twenty minutes later and a quarter of the way around the park before Newt spoke again. Queenie had been oddly quiet and though he was tempted to ask what was bothering her, a selfish part of him was revelling a bit in the quiet and the time to get his head back in order after such a mad week. But he felt that a fair few things were being left unmentioned and knew that she was just waiting to bring them up. She’d been so amazingly patient and supportive with him, he couldn’t not bring it up. “I haven’t seen Jacob in a while and you’ve been working rather a lot. Is everything okay?”

She looked over at him from where she’d been looking out into the night, big eyes searching the dark park a little distantly, “Yeah, of course it is, why wouldn’t it be?”

He knew he had to tread carefully here. “Well, I understand that he’s probably busy with the plans for the bakery and that you’ve been doing long hours to help support that and correct me if I’m wrong but-” he sighed, “-well, I think it’d be wrong of me not ask if everything was going alright and get an honest answer out of you?”

She exhaled a laugh and smiled, curling her arm in and around his as they started walking along the edge of the pond, the water glimmering dark in the lampposts that were dotted every twenty feet or so. Newt felt the compulsion to keep his eyes on the cracked pathway they walked on, the water holding far less appeal than it once did. “I’m being honest, Newt, I’m happy, I just-” she sighed again, “-it’s like with you and your mystery-man! I have some thinking to do.”

Newt pulled them to a stop at an area closed in by thickets of trees on one side and the pond to the other, withdrawing his arm from hers as he stared, “Queenie, I’ve known Gellert for barely over a week and you’ve been dating Jacob for _six years._ You love each other, it’s not the same thing and I’m quite sure you know that.”

“Aha! You finally gave me his name!” Queenie of course jumped on the least important part of what he’d said and grinned at him widely, “Gellert, huh? Sounds fancy? European, maybe? I bet he’s from Europe.”

“Why do you always phrase it like that? Like Europe is a country? It’s a continent, Queenie.” He couldn’t help the correction that blurted out before he shook his head as if to clear it and added, “But that’s not what’s important. What’s important is that, well, that you’re honest. With me, and more importantly, with Jacob.”

“I am! I am! I love him and I care about him more than anything else in the world!” she cried but then stepped away from him on the path with a click of heels, turning her back on him as her hand flew to her mouth. Newt stepped forward, worried that she was more upset than he had thought, crying even. But he was proven wrong as she let out a small scream and jumped back into him. “Holy shit, holy fucking shit!”

“What? What is it? Queenie-"

Newt moved to stand next to her. There was something hanging from the trees ahead of them. It took Newt a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the darkness enough to properly see it but when he did, he let out a low curse and stumbled back even quicker than his friend had, the words slipping from his lips in a terrified exhale, “Bloody hell.”

He thought, frantically, for the first few moments, that what he was seeing was simply a twisted combination of Graves’ description of the corpses he’d seen on the case he worked with Gellert and a fevered mind – that he was much sicker than he had previously thought. Maybe he’d never woken up after all and this was simply a continuation of the icy-pond fever-dreams he’d been having. But there was no ice to be found here. Mud, rain and cold certainly, but the sight before him was far more graphic and _real_ than the description Graves had given. The way the dried, stark white skin had been stretched and moulded to form such a perfect outline of the form underneath, thin and slightly translucent whilst still holding the press of organs and innards where they had been prior to this poor man’s death. For it was clearly a man, the face had been left mostly intact, the eyes wide and with that particular sheen of white-blue lifelessness that Newt had seen in crime photos from when he’d visited Theseus at the station a few times. The snapshots lining walls and boards, lying on desks and following Newt with their lifeless, empty gazes that simultaneously saw nothing and everything.

The real thing was something quite different. 

Icy blue staring out of a drawn, pale face. Prominent cheekbones. A flash of bright blonde hair visible in the light of Queenie’s phone behind him as she frantically dialled. Newt heard her voice in the background, demanding to talk to the police immediately. That she and her friend had discovered a mutilated body in the centre of Phoenix Park. But Newt found himself not listening much, instead stepping closer as something niggled at him, a familiarity to the features before him – as gaunt and perverted by the intent of some murderer as they might be. The legs of the man had been broken, bent backwards and manipulated brutally to fit into the…what he could only agree with Graves as calling a cocoon, he supposed and he couldn’t even begin to guess where the arms were underneath all of…that. He felt bile pushing at the back of his throat and forced himself to break away, to take a deep breath and stare into the water instead, to try to clear his head.

Bloody hell. _Bloody hell!_

He didn’t realise Queenie was off the phone or that she’d approached him until he felt her hand on his shoulder and he had a moment of utter blind, unreasonable panic when he thought that it was the missing hand of the corpse that had found him. That it was the dead man who was reaching out to him for sanctuary or comfort that would be coming far, far too late. He flinched but turned to face Queenie whose makeup was running down her face in black and violet streaks, smearing her cheeks and he numbly hugged her back when she pressed herself forward into his arms, her snotty, sopping face rubbing into the crook of his shoulder. He didn’t notice that much though, just held his friend somewhat mechanically and stared straight ahead into the water, purposefully ignoring the white blur at the edge of his vision that he knew to be the desecrated corpse of some poor individual that had fallen victim to the very same killer that his brother, Albus, Gellert and Graves had warned him of in their own ways. In the same park that he ran around on his own regularly, less than ten minutes from his flat. Maybe they had been right to worry.

This could have easily been him. Or Queenie for that matter.

Though thinking of it, hadn’t Graves and Theseus both mentioned something about the victims all being young men? But was it the same killer? The killer Graves had been tracking and the one Theseus had mentioned? It seemed likely with the description of the murder scenes. God, when had this become something he had to think about? He was pulling back from Queenie and getting out his own phone, flicking through his contacts until he got to the one he needed and didn’t pause before hitting call.

There was a far too long series of phoneline beeps before he heard a tired voice sigh into the phone, “Look Newt, now’s not a good time and-”

“We just found a body.”

“What?”

“We found a body. In the park. And I-I think-…I think it's like the ones you were telling me about before, a-a few weeks ago,” his voice started cracking a little bit as he spoke, something leaking through that had eluded him up until now.

“Newt, slow down. What do you mean ‘we’? Who is there with you?”

“Queenie. It’s Queenie. We’re in Phoenix Park and we were walking and we found a body.”

“Christ, Newt, have you called the police?”

“I’m calling you, aren’t I?” Newt bit back out of habit, letting out a shaky, borderline hysterical laugh before taking a deep breath. “Queenie phoned them already, I just-…I thought I should let you know.”

“Alright, just stay there, don’t touch anything and when the police arrive, do as they say. Don’t be the annoying git you usually are. I’m going to be there soon. I got into the city this afternoon but it’ll take me a little while to get there,” Theseus’ voice was thankfully steady, calming even and it helped the tight knot in Newt’s chest ease a little with each deep breath he took.

But then when his brain slowed down enough to better cognize his situation, what might happen when the police arrived and his panic rose anew, “Thee, I-” he lowered his voice, stepping further away from Queenie and the corpse as he did so, “-what about my… _priors_.”

Newt heard a frustrated exhale and the slamming of a car door on the other side of the line, “I’ll sort it out when I get there, just try your very best not to do anything stupid. Be cooperative and they won’t have too much reason to look into your background as long as you don’t give them a reason to. You’re not a murderer or an accessory and you have nothing to do with this crime so they shouldn’t have any reason to suspect anything else.”

“Right…” Newt said, albeit a little distantly, nodding to no one even as he heard the sound of sirens in the near-distance. He couldn’t be sure how much time it’d been since they found the body but the timer on his call said he’d been on the line for over six minutes somehow. No wonder Theseus seemed so concerned. Well, that and the fact that he had just told his policeman brother he’d found a mutilated body less than ten minutes from his home.

“Newt? You still there?”

“Yes, I’m here-” he looked over to where Queenie was rubbing her own arms almost frantically with brown leather gloved hands, her eyes still streaming but not making a single sound. Newt out a breath and stepped back towards her, telling his brother quietly, “Sorry but I’ll talk to you when you get here. I need-...Queenie is-”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it, see you soon.”

He hung up and put an arm around a shivering Queenie until a group of people including three uniformed police, two paramedics, a flurry of what looked to be crime scene responders and a great-coated man sporting a bowler-hat arrived, instantly splitting off into their respective roles. One of the paramedics came over and asked each of them if they were at all injured and when both responded in the negative, she merely handed them both silver-foil blankets and went over to assist her colleagues in cataloguing the crime scene, the flash of a camera almost blinding in the dark of the park.

Newt held the foil blanket a bit numbly, looking down at it, not quite sure what it was supposed to do but did notice dimly that Queenie had wrapped hers around her shaking shoulders. He and Queenie were drawn away further towards the park entrance as the area around the pond and trees was cordoned off and they told to wait there by one of the uniformed officers in a high-vis vest. They stood there for several minutes whilst the man in the bowler-hat spoke with his colleagues and the two friends huddled together, Queenie with her fingers still wrapped tight around the edges of the blanket and Newt idly playing with the sand in his pocket. 

The great-coated man eventually came over with a suitably grim expression on his thin face, large brown eyes roving over both cryptically. “I am DC Yusuf Kama and I’ll be needing your names, occupations, addresses and everything you can tell me about what happened here.” His accented voice was as appropriate to the grim circumstances as one might expect but he looked tired too, the darker smudges under his eyes hinting to long hours and the coffee smell on him to a caffeine dependency that Newt oft associated with the detectives he knew.

Newt nodded, rattling off the information as thoroughly as he could, his voice remaining low and throaty, the pressure in his chest feeling like it was forcing out each word he spoke with a violent force. When he’d finished, Kama looked at him quizzically, his head tilted before he asked, “So you and your girlfriend-”

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

“He’s gay.”

Their denials were almost synchronous and Kama chuckled lightly, scribbling something out on the notes list he’d been writing and writing something else in its place, “My apologies, in this sort of situation, it is usually safe to assume that when two young people go for a stroll around the park at night, that there is romantic intention there of some sort.”

“I’m sorry,” Newt said, a little incredulously, “But is this entirely relevant?”

“No, no, of course not, but it doesn’t hurt to get the facts straight about the relationships at play here. For the records, of course.”

“Okay then,” Newt said slowly.

“But as I was saying, you and your friend were walking here because it was near to your home, Mr Scamander?”

“Yes,” Newt replied slowly, not quite sure where Kama was going with the question.

“Are you aware that bodies in similar states to this have been found recently all over the city and surrounding areas?”

“Uh, yes, it was in the papers.”

“Are you also aware that the last three have all been students at the same university that you and Miss Goldstein attend?”

“No…”

“And I suppose you are also unaware that the last one was found within the university grounds?”

Newt cottoned on then and shook his head emphatically, “No, I was not.”

“Me neither,” Queenie said faintly, looking a little queasy.

The DC looked on at Queenie with sympathy evident in his dark eyes. “Miss Goldstein, I believe that it might be best for you to go home. Do you have anyone who can escort you?”

“I can,” Newt put in but Kama was already shaking his head.

“I’m afraid I’ve got some follow up questions for you, Mr Scamander.”

“Why? What’d Newt do?” Queenie asked indignantly even as the heavy feeling in Newt’s stomach doubled all of a sudden.

“Nothing, Miss Goldstein but it seems that you have answered all the questions I had for you. If we need to interview you again, someone will call but for now, I need to speak with Mr Scamander.”

“It’s alright, Queenie, you should call Jacob to come pick you up,” Newt reassured her when she opened her mouth argue with the DC and gently squeezed her hand.

“Okay…if you’re sure.”

“Yes, it's fine, I’ll call you later. But make sure you get Jacob to come pick you up first. Even ask Jared if you need to but don’t go home alone. You’ve got my spare key if you can’t reach anyone.” 

She nodded and wandered off towards the entrance to the park, already dialling and Newt relaxed somewhat as he heard her say, “Hello? Oh honey, something real awful happened!”

“You are a good friend to her, please forgive me for assuming your relationship,” Kama commented and Newt looked at him sideways, up through his fringe, not sure quite how to take the comment and simply nodded mutely. The detective took it in his stride as he said, “Now if you’ll please follow me, I think this should be continued at the station. It is cold out here and neither is it a place to linger. I think that this discussion shall warrant a more formal setting.”

Newt froze, thinking of Theseus’ promised arrival, somehow doubting that he could delay leaving with the detective without coming off as decidedly guilty “I, uh-”

“Is there a problem, Mr Scamander?” Kama asked and it was clearly a challenge, the softer tones he’d used with Queenie gone and Newt shook his head mutely, following the man even as he felt as though he might be sick at any second. The dizziness and aches threatening to consume him, the only thing that was stopping him was the images of what he had just seen pressing against the back of his eyes with almost painful force.

He was silent for the entire journey over to the station, thankfully having been invited to sit in the passenger seat of the police car rather than the back. He knew from experience that being placed in the backseat implied a higher level of suspicion from the officers involved and that they were closer to handcuffing and detaining you than letting you go. He was escorted into a quiet office, a single desk, a bin, some mugs on a table and four chairs residing there where Newt was indicated to sit. The young man was offered water which he took gratefully, finishing the first cup so quickly that the officer who’d offered it left a jug by him on the table before he left.

Kama came in a few minutes later with a hefty-looking file in one hand and a mug of coffee in the other. The file was not promising. But the coffee was. Police officers who suspected he was likely to act volatilely or violently wouldn’t bring in a potential instrument with which to scald the interviewer. But the file, depending on its contents, could prove a little trickier. If it was on the case, it was a pretty standard procedure. If it was on him, that would only spell trouble for the Zoologist.

Kama sat opposite and opened the file, unfortunately, not at an angle that Newt could see but he wasn’t left wondering for long as the detective got to it without much ado.

“So Mr Scamander, have you ever been to Temple-Brew Coffee?”

A funny feeling stirred in Newt then and he nodded, “Yes, a few times before.”

“When was the most recent occasion? Within the last seven months?”

“Yes, last week.”

Kama withdrew a picture from the file and showed him an image that left Newt confused for a second before the bottom of his stomach dropped out. Bleached blonde hair, a pierced ear and big, dark eyes. It was the barista that had served him. The same one who’d been kind of flirty and had smirked at him, having assumed he and Gellert were getting it on in the bathroom of the place he worked at.

Kama peered at him over the top of the file very pointedly, “You know him, I take it?”

“Sort of…I think I saw him around the university a few times and he served me coffee once – the last time I was there, that is.”

“Did you see him again at any point after that?”

“No.”

“Not around the campus?”

“No.”

“And you’re quite sure about that?”

“Yes,” Newt assured him, eyes glued to the picture in front of him, not really taking it in but not wanting to look anywhere else. “I’m sorry but is this going somewhere?”

Kama flicked to the back of the file and span it around on the table to face Newt over the top of the spot he was staring it and Newt’s eyes refocussed just long enough to catch a few lines. He bit back a groan at what he saw. Kama offered him a grim smile. “Yes, Mr Scamander, we are aware of your history and as much as it would be easy to try to connect your long, _long_ rap sheet of trespassing, vandalism, property damage, theft and various other offences to the murders that have been occurring in this city. Ones, I might add, that seems to be linked to you in a number of ways-” Newt winced heavily before Kama finished “-I don’t think that murder. Let alone murders this…heinous, are something you are capable of.”

Newt almost sighed in relief but held it in as Kama opened his mouth again “However, you being the one to find the latest victim puts matters into more troubling light than it otherwise would have.”

“You can’t just chalk it down to coincidence and we could both be on our way?” Newt asked with the smallest quirk of a smile that he was almost certain was inappropriate considering the circumstances but the nerves drove out of him all the same. 

Kama fixed him with a stern look and Newt ducked his head apologetically.

Thankfully, the detective moved past that and pressed, “You used to live in London, correct? You are English born and bred?”

“Yes.”

“You originally started your studies at King’s College, studied there for six months but transferred over here when you were nineteen?”

The Zoologist nodded.

“And you travelled for four years after you completed your undergraduate degree? Inciting chaos most everywhere you went?”

“Well, I’m not sure I’d put it quite like that,” Newt protested, albeit a little lamely. Honestly, it wasn’t far off the truth.

“You went to Paris?”

“Amongst other places, yes.”

“Bucharest?”

“Yes.”

“Sarajevo?”

“Yes.”

“Papua New Guinea?”

“Yes.”

“Phoenix, Arizona?”

“Yes.”

“And New York, by any chance?”

“No.”

“Hmm,” said Kama in a somewhat non-committal manner before asking, “Why did you return to Dublin, may I ask?” 

“Well, my studies, I suppose, finding a job in my field of expertise isn’t exactly easy even with the proper qualifications, so I figured that getting my master’s couldn’t hurt.”

“Maybe not,” Kama admitted mildly. “Until people continue getting hurt around you.”

“I’m sorry?”

“I’m referring to the death of Leta Lestrange.”

Newt’s face, if possible, paled further.

Kama evidently took note of this, “A sore subject, I believe?”

“L-Leta-…her death had nothing to do with me.”

“I never said it did,” Kama replied evenly and Newt fought the urge to roll his eyes.

“No, but you didn’t have to,” Newt huffed. “As you have probably read, I’ve been in enough interviews to know where this sort of line of questioning goes.”

“You do, don’t you?” he said, flipping over the file back to his side of the table, deliberately leaving the picture where it was. Newt’s eyes were instinctively drawn back to it.

“What was his name?”

Kama fixed him with a speculative look, “Theo Peverell.”

“And the other students? The ones who were murdered?”

“You’re being awfully calm about this, Mr Scamander.”

Newt looked Kama dead-on in the eyes then, tainted-green to brown, “I know where this is going and I don’t want you to come back to me at some later point in this investigation with some other flimsy connection to try and accuse me of something this awful so if you don’t mind, I’m going to save you some trouble and ask for the names of the people who died so I can tell you the truth now. Is that alright with you, Detective Kama? Or would you rather draw this out and let more people die whilst you’re asking the wrong person questions?”

Kama looked at him for a very long time before he let out a breath and said, “Henry Shaw, Credence Barebone and more recently, Alfred McLagan. Those were the names of the last three victims before Peverell who were also students at the same universities you attended.”

Newt blinked and the sinking feeling returned. “Credence?”

Kama straightened immediately at that, his hackles practically rising, “You know him?”

“Yes,” Newt nodded numbly, “He...he attended King’s College at the same time I did. Though I haven’t seen him in years.”

It was only part of the truth. The truth was that Credence was Albus’ much younger half-brother. A boy Newt had met on the open day he had attended when he'd first met Albus at the age of eighteen before he had begun at the university. A nervous but sweet young man who had been on the verge of starting at one of the finest universities two years early at the age of sixteen. A child prodigy that had come from a lineage of similarly gifted minds.

“How well did you know him?”

“I…not really, I met him at an open day and then spoke to him a few times whilst I was there but we were doing different courses. Different departments too, I reckon. And, as you know, I left not long after.”

The full truth was that Credence was the only person who had known Newt and Albus were together, having caught them at the professor’s house once and the elder sibling having told the younger to keep mum on the subject. Credence had been surprisingly supportive of the whole thing and Newt had even begun a mentorship of sorts with the boy, trying to advise him as best he could on life in London and coming to terms with his newfound sexuality. Not that Newt had been an expert on either matter, mind you, but Credence, having come from a deeply religious foster home background overseas, had next to no life experience when he came to meet his brother a year before Newt had met him. It had been Albus who encouraged Credence to pursue a degree and to develop his gifts as best he could. Newt, as someone who ended up being around Albus for quite a while in the short time he’d studied in London, had subsequently spent a fair bit of time with Credence too. 

He couldn’t believe that Albus hadn’t mentioned any of this. God, was that why he’d called? Why he’d been so worried about the killer in the city and Newt? It was all such a mess.

He breathed in deeply before asking, “H-how-…how long ago did Credence, um, when did he-?”

Kama eyed him thoughtfully, “Mr Barebone was found dead two weeks ago.”

Newt felt something prickling behind his eyes again, maybe tears, maybe the pressure of his brain about to implode, he couldn’t be sure but he managed to choke out more words, “What exactly do you mean ‘found dead’? When did he die?”

“We cannot be entirely sure because of the state his body was left in but from decomposition, it seemed to be at least five years.”

Around the time Newt had left. Around the very same time that Albus had changed so drastically. Had this been what did it? The death of his brother? It felt as though the walls were closing in on him, tighter by the second and at first, he barely registered Kama’s voice. 

“You must admit that the fact you know three of the victims, attended the same universities as them in different countries and were the one to find the last…it does not look good on you, Mr Scamander.”

“But barely!” Newt protested, his voice thinning in distress, his hands clenched white-knuckled around the edges of his hard metal seat. “Why would I kill any of these men? Why would I want to do that to _anyone_?”

“It’s not up to me to be questioning the thinking of why people do things that heinous, Mr Scamander. That’s the criminologists’ and shrinks’ jobs. My job is to find the truth and make sure that the person or persons responsible for it pay for what they’ve done.”

“But the point remains that that person is _not me,_ ” Newt insisted.

“That remains to be seen,” Kama replied but before anything else could happen, there was a knock at the door and one of the uniformed officers from before beckoned the detective out of the room. The second he left the room, Newt buried his head in his hands, fingers rubbing roughly through his scalp, tugging furiously at the strands of hair there, moaning low under his breath as the sick feeling reared its ugly head again. Unfortunately, not even deep breaths could hold it back this time and he was forced to lean over the side of the table and forcefully expelled the contents of his stomach into the nearby rubbish bin. He heaved for some time, coughed and then closed his eyes, leaning back in the chair and chugged down water like there was no tomorrow. And judging from his current run of luck and the revelations that didn’t seem to stop slamming into him…there really might not be.

The next person to come into the room was familiar even before Newt felt a hand on his shoulder, his older brother crouching down next to him, staring at him with wide, worried blue eyes.

“What’ve you done now, Newt?” 


	11. The Papercut that kills you and the Priest that you ignored

_October 23 rd _

It wasn’t long after Theseus’ arrival that Newt was released from police custody under the strict advisement that he was not to leave either the city or the country until he was told otherwise. Whilst Newt’s life, studies and routine would not really be disrupted all that much by the restrictions, he still found himself numbly resenting them, grumbling a little under his breath as they went to leave the station.

“Newt, you’re bloody lucky they’re letting you go at all. You could’ve told me that you knew half the victims.” 

“Now I wouldn’t say that half was exactly a fair estima-”

“Shut it,” Theseus cut across him, scowling up from where he had been furiously scribbling things onto some paperwork by the front desk. The front area of the precinct was quite quiet considering the hour but Newt had never felt particularly comfortable in police stations, no matter the alarming regularity with which he managed to find himself in them. Kama was eying him from across the room, stood by some of his colleagues, talking lowly to them and splitting his attention between them and the zoologist. Clearly, Newt hadn’t won any friends there. If it weren’t for Theseus, he knew that the DC wouldn’t have let him go that night, probably would have attempted to hold him on past charges until he could find some way to link Newt to the murders.

The elder Scamander’s expression softened soon after he completed the documents, scrawling a barely legible signature as he turned back to his brother, placing a bolstering hand upon the pallid Scamander’s shoulder. “I know you didn’t do anything wrong but you’ve got to admit that this all looks pretty damning,” he lowered his voice to just above a murmur as he leant closer, “and your history isn’t exactly helping matters.”

Newt levelled his brother with a hard stare over the paperwork as it was his turn to fill out numerous little boxes and jot down answers and signatures. “I’m not going to apologise for what I’ve done and you should know better than to ask for that.”

“You could at least-” it was Theseus’ turn to be cut off this time as a disbelieving voice sounded across the room. Recognising the voice almost instantly, Newt hunched over the desk and the paperwork, inwardly groaning as a glance over his shoulder revealed the suited-form of Graves making his way over to them.

“Good god Scamander, it’s been years!” Graves exclaimed, clapping Theseus on the shoulder and Newt hunkered down further, ducking his head, staring intently at the already completed paperwork with the hope that Graves would move on without noticing him.

“Graves? What in blazes are you doing here?”

“Working, what else?”

“I have to say it’s a relief to see you after that nasty business in 09.”

“Still speaking like it’s the yonder days of Scotland Yard, I see. Glad to see some things haven’t changed.”

Newt began to wonder if he really _hadn’t_ woken up and that this was his own version of some bizarre Wonderland cautionary tale or spiritual journey. Because if it was, it was simultaneously exhausting, irritating and not all that wondrous. Lord, he needed a break from all this. Another two days in bed sounded good. However, he had lectures the next day, creatures to care for and bills to pay so that wasn’t really an option. Leaving the paperwork, he tried to slip by the chatting detectives and winced as Graves’ eyes landed on him almost immediately with evident surprise.

“Newt?”

He winced, halting in his tracks and turned to face both men, “You know, at this point, Graves, I’m fairly certain that this _does_ count as stalking.”

“I’m here because another body was found,” Graves replied, “And as it's not yours, what are you doing here? And with Scamander, no less?”

“Hang on, what’s this about stalking?” Theseus interjected, looking between the two and Newt had rather vivid deja’vu to the events of Friday night, inwardly hoping that it didn’t result in another fiasco like the last one.

Graves looked a little sheepish and Newt was more than happy to clarify matters, “Detective Graves has recently made rather a habit of popping up unwanted wherever I happen to be.”

“Is this true, Graves?” Theseus asked, looking at his colleague with raised eyebrows and the American shrugged slightly.

“More or less.”

“Care to explain yourself?”

“Not really sure why it's your business,” Graves replied, looking between the two of them for a few moments, dark eyes roving from their hair, features and eyes before something evidently clicked under that slick haircut, “Oh, you’re related?”

“Brothers,” Theseus clarified, frown still firmly in place and Graves straightened a little, clearing his throat as he did so.

“Ah, well, I’m involved with a friend of his so we bumped into each other at a pub and then Newt here just so happened to be at the house of a consultant of mine late at night not long after so…”

Theseus turned on Newt, “Why were you at the house of a police consultant? Please tell me you’re not holding back something important on me here, Newt.”

Newt folded his arms over his chest, frowning at both Graves and his brother; the former for so successfully turning the situation on him and Theseus for falling for it. “Look, I’m not entirely sure that any of this matters and as I’m not being charged with anything – by any of you – I hope no one minds if I just go home.”

Theseus fixed him with such a look that Newt knew he was about to launch into one of his infamous rants and sighed, turning and leaving the precinct without so much as a glance back. He was tired, he was stressed and for some reason, the first person he really wanted to see or speak to right now was both in another country and a blatant liar. There was part of him that understood why Albus might lie about something like this though that part was eclipsed by the old hurt and resentment that resided within the young man at the way things had ground to a halt between them. It was a sting that somehow never got easier to bear; not with how much the man had meant to him…or how much Newt thought he had meant to him.

He was accosted as he was waiting at the stop just down the road as he had expected to be by one of the men he had just left behind and he was only partially relieved that it was his sibling and not Graves. “Where're you headed, little brother?”

“Does it much matter?”

“It does if you’re planning on skipping town and getting in even more trouble than you’re already in.”

Newt sighed and checked his watch. “It’s been a long night, Thee, a ridiculously long night that seems to have been going on since Friday somehow. I’ve got a job and studies and creatures to take care of. I’m not going anywhere. Just home.” He shot Theseus a brief smile, “Promise.”

“I came here to help with this case in particular, by the way, Newt. Whatever it is that they think they have on you is circumstantial at best but if there’s anything you know or anything you remember, you’ve got to tell me.”

“You’re right, it _is_ circumstantial. It’s a coincidence and I’ve got enough on my plate right now without adding having seen things like _that_ -" here his voice shook slightly and Theseus’ eyes were burning him with overbearing amounts of sympathy “-and being accused of being the one to do it or help it or whatever else they suspect me of...it’s-...it’s too much.”

The bus thankfully chose that moment to appear at the end of the road, visible as a glowing purple double-decker beacon of hope that he might escape this nightmare and drift off into a more pleasant turn of events. He could sense his brother’s aggravation and concern so spoke quickly as the bus slowed on its approach. “I’ll see you for that lunch we had planned on Tuesday, alright?”

“Newt-” Theseus cut himself off before nodding slowly. “Fine, just get home and get some rest, you idiot.” 

“Shall do,” Newt lied, stepping onto the bus, flashing his student bus-pass from his wallet and moving to a seat on the thankfully mostly empty bottom deck. Sunday nights were usually a calmer time and after having lost the most of the past two days and having all of this crammed into such a short span of cognition, Newt felt simultaneously drained and buzzing with electrifying energy, jittery even.

He checked his phone as he watched the rain-soaked streets go past outside of the fogged bus window and fired off texts to reassure Jared, Jacob and Queenie, receiving replies from the latter two, wishing him well and telling him that Queenie and Jacob were currently curled up watching a movie at their flat, trying their very best to forget the events of the night. He knew that that was something easier said than done but at least Queenie had the support of her loving boyfriend to rely on. Hopefully, it might draw them closer together again and maybe heal the rift that had seemingly formed. Newt tried to find comfort in the thought that maybe, just maybe, one good thing might’ve come from this train wreck of a weekend.

He arrived home about a half-hour lately and entered his building at the same time one of his upstairs neighbours was exiting, the older woman smiling as she held the door for him and Newt proceeded to his floor with an exhausted slump to his shoulders. He shouldn’t be tired, not after sleeping the weekend away, but that was what he was, nonetheless, and as he had classes the whole of the next day, he knew that getting some sleep was probably the best idea right now. Even if the threat of cold, dead eyes lingering just beyond the realm of consciousness loomed as an anxiety-inducing threat all the same.

It wasn’t until he had already entered his flat that he belatedly realised the door was unlocked, he had two almost simultaneous notions that he had either left it unlocked earlier by accident or that Jared was once again crashing at his place before he was grabbed by strong hands and slammed back against the now closed door. A hand pressed tightly over his mouth before his shout of surprise could escape him and his eyes barely registered the masked man who was holding him as he struggled instinctively against the biting grip. He flinched as he was turned forcibly around by yet more hands – more than simply the man he had seen – and his arms were efficiently pinned behind his back, the rip of tape audible over that of his own muffled cries. The material was used to lash his wrists together tightly, wrapping around them in thick layers before it was cut off, he was spun again and the hand left his face. before he could draw breath to shout, however, another length was pressed over his mouth then round his head twice before being cut off at the front by a familiar blade.

His breaths came in noisy pants in and out of his nose as the lamp nearest him was clicked on, silhouetting the grey, harsh form and face of Grimmson, two masked men standing nearby and the one holding Newt making four intruders. His flat was a mess – much more so than usual – and Newt’s eyes scanned the space desperately, feeling further panic rise in him like acid bile when he only saw two of the cats and no Lila. All the rest of his flatmates were present and though they seemed agitated, Newt guessed that the intruders had been there long enough that the birds had become more used to them as while Arry was still chirruping and pacing on her bar, it was nowhere near the racket she was capable of. Helga and Frederick were curled in the corner, fur raised and hissing quietly, one of the intruders sporting bloody scratches on his hands that told Newt that his companions had held their own quite well indeed. Had his lips not been sealed shut with sticky, suffocating layers of tape, Newt would’ve demanded where Monty and Lila were and what the men had done with them but as it was, all he could do was go along with the wishes of the man holding him as he was dragged forward and shoved forcibly to his knees. Grimmson was sat on the end of Newt’s bed, leant forward and staring down at the knelt zoologist with steely calm and a general sort of distaste.

“Hello again, Mr Scamander.”

Newt stared.

“You can’t really be surprised to see us again.”

No, he wasn’t really. In fact, there had been a part of him that had been wondering why it had taken this long for them to catch up with him. Though that was the same part of him that had tactfully decided to not tempt fate by questioning it too deeply. Maybe he should have. Maybe he should’ve told Theseus, or hell, even Graves. Unfortunately, hindsight being 20/20 wasn’t going to help him a lick now. He winced as his shoulders and back ached anew at the position his arms had been forced into, he shifted on his knees on the wooden floor, trying his best to control his limited breathing. Newt could tell that this was not intended to be a nice, sociable reminder that he owed them money. 

“As you can see,” Grimmson continued, gesturing with one hand to the bombshell of a flat, “We had a look around for what you owe us but quite unfortunately for you, we came up disappointed.” 

He leant forward, closer to Newt until the zoologist could smell the acrid scents of cigarette smoke and a hint of blood but he could have been imagining the latter one because of what had occurred the last time they met.

“So I think that the only logical assumptions I can draw from digging through your flea-infested hole of a flat and coming up with only-” Grimmson glanced over to one of his thugs who was holding a plastic bag of what looked to be loose change.

“€12.63, sir.”

“€12.63,” Grimmson echoed with a faux disappointed sigh, “I’ve got to assume that you either spent my money, which you _stole_ ” Newt made a sound of protest behind the tape but Grimmson ignored him, “or that you have it on you.” He looked to the man holding Newt with cold dispassion, “Search him.”

Newt grunted as he was thrown to the ground, his chin colliding painfully with the floor and cheek searing as something – probably a splinter – jabbed into it. The man followed him down, patting him down roughly, digging his hands in every pocket, exclaiming in disgust and surprise as he came back with a handful of damp sand and slugs from one. He withdrew Newt’s phone and battered wallet with its Greenpeace sticker on it and threw both over to another lackey who pulled out the twenty-odd euros and a random pound coin in there with evident disappointment. Newt didn’t have much of a chance to notice that reaction, however before he was roughly rolled onto his back and the hands were pushing up his jumper, patting his stomach and sides for god knows what. Large wads of money stuck to his sides? Newt wasn’t a complete idiot, he’d hidden a quarter of the cash, spent another quarter and then put the rest in his bank account. The one that wasn’t under his real name and may or may not have been used multiple times in multiple countries for less-than-legal activities.

Unfortunately, none of that helped him now. If anything, it was probably making matters worse as he now had no simple answer to his current predicament as the handsy guy gripped him by the hair, pulling him up onto his knees again as the zoologist let out a low hiss.

“Nothing on him, sir.” 

“Well, that’s unfortunate.” He nodded to the man beside Newt and the zoologist froze as the knife that had been used previously to slash open his arm and cut the tape that now bound him was pressed to his throat, the man using his grip on Newt’s hair to tug his head back against his leg and keep the young man steady. Grimmson leant forward and dug his nail into the seam of the tape around Newt’s mouth, teasing it as he looked Newt dead on in the eyes and said, “If you scream or make any sort of indication that you need help, you will regret it. Understand?”

Newt made a soft noise of affirmation underneath the tape, not daring to nod with the way the cold steel of the black-frosted blade was teasing his Adam’s Apple. He winced as the tape was ripped off, pulling off a layer of light stubble around his cheeks and jaw and pulling the hairs at the base of his neck. He wisely kept silent but the blade wasn’t removed – a reminder, a precaution and a threat. It went well heeded.

“Now, why don’t you start by telling me where my money is. Then maybe you might stand a chance of winning some good points for yourself by telling me what it was about our last encounter gave you the impression I would simply forgive and forget you taking it in the first place?” he released a dry chuckle that didn’t reach his grey eyes, “Because I think the feedback might be beneficial when making future deals. I do so hate to give people the wrong impression after all.”

Newt swallowed, peering up at the criminal through his sweat-mussed hair before he quietly suggested, “Perhaps try growing a goatee or perhaps a moustache, I think people might be intimidated by the more classic villain look than-”

He really should have expected the sucker punch that rocked his head back and he could only feel grateful that the man holding him had had the consideration to remove the knife from his throat beforehand. His cheek throbbed painfully and he was pretty sure his lip had split judging by the taste of blood tinging his tongue, he didn’t make a sound though and Grimmson looked slightly irked as Newt worked his jaw a little before went back to staring resolutely at the other man.

“Okay, as you seem to be more mentally challenged than I previously thought, I think we’ll just stick to the simple question of what you did with my money.”

“Well,” Newt began slowly, somewhat wearily wary of being punched again but feeling the need to get the point across all the same, “If we’re being entirely forthright here, you did, in fact, get the blood you wanted which was all you asked from me at the time so technically speaking, I think that-”

It was a backhand this time and once again, Newt’s head snapped back but the difference this time around was that the man who’d been holding him stepped back at some non-verbal signal from his boss and Newt fell onto his bound hands, wrenching them painfully and he couldn’t hold in a cry as pain flared up his wrists like a string of firecrackers. He rolled himself onto his side, gasping through clenched teeth before he tried to get his knees back under him only to be bowled over by a swift kick to the stomach and he fell once more with a loud thud that caused the cats huddled in the corner to hiss and their claws to protract. Newt forced a smile onto his lips over at them and made quiet chirruping and hushing noises to try to reassure the frightened felines. It didn’t seem to do too much but they at least stayed where they were, he didn’t want them getting involved.

“What do I have to do before you start taking this seriously, Scamander?”

“I’m being quite serious,” Newt gasped into the floorboards and was rewarded by one of the lackeys kicking him in the back, forcing a grunt from him as his old injuries flared to life with vicious clarity.

“Why don’t you just give me the money? Is it really worth all this?”

“Is it really worth all this to you either?” Newt asked, awkwardly manoeuvring him over onto his shoulder to look up at the man perched on his bed, “I’m quite sure you have more than enough money already, you said so yourself. Or else you wouldn’t be lending it out to people.”

“This is more a matter of reputation, I’m afraid. You let one person off scot-free and all of a sudden, the fear just disappears and people don’t respect you anymore.”

“Seems logical, I suppose,” Newt half-groaned. “Though I can’t imagine that I exactly run in the same circles as you so you probably wouldn’t need to worry about that,” he blinked a little slowly as cognition kicked back in, “Unless you had more riding on this than simply money or reputation.” 

“Smart boy catches on fast,” one of the lackeys grunted with a laugh and whilst Grimmson shot him a look, he smiled thinly all the same.

“Art is a loudmouth but he’s right,” Grimmson said, inclining his head toward the lackey in question whose eyes narrowed beneath his mask momentarily before they went back to watching the quivering cats in the corner. “Your case is important to a client of mine and he’s not someone who likes to be disappointed.”

“Why me?”

“Let’s just say he’s the one who informed us of your previous misdemeanours internationally. Arizona, specifically.”

Ah, bugger.

There was only one person he could think of that was influential, angry and obsessive enough to do something like this years down the line and in another country. Someone who just so happened to be in prison thanks to the man that Newt was currently…involved with.

Mason Abernathy. And that could not mean anything good at all.

“Oh ho, I see you know who I’m talking about, maybe you _do_ catch on to some things, after all.”

“Perhaps,” Newt agreed slowly, not knowing what to do with the new information; not that he’d known what to do in the first place, mind you.

“So, the very least I can do here is get back the money you owe,” Grimmson told him amiably, taking the knife from his lackey and twiddling it thoughtfully between his fingers. “If Abernathy had his way, you’d be found in little bits all over the world as a warning to any others who’d gotten on his bad side.” He smiled down at Newt, “But as he’s in prison for the foreseeable future, I’ll be calling the shots and as I don’t see any point in risking myself or my business by adding murder to my rap-sheet, I think that I’ll just be getting my money back from you, along with the insurance that you won’t be getting away from this time.”

At that, Newt tried to push himself back up to his feet but was felled once again by another kick, this one to the teeth and when he hit the floor, he didn’t try to get up again, groaning lowly as the world spun around him in lazy circles. Eventually, he managed to roll back onto his side so that he was somewhat facing Grimmson once more and this time his eyes went wide as he saw the man had just plucked a hissing Monty from under the bed by the scruff of his neck and all thoughts of self-preservation fled from his mind as he blindly threw himself toward the bastard, head-butting, kneeling and shouldering for all he was worth. He was pulled back too quickly into the arms of two of the thugs to really deal any damage but Grimmson was incensed, nonetheless and took a tighter grip on the squirming, hissing cat, squeezing his tufty grey neck until Newt cried out. “Stop! Please, I’ll tell you where the money is, just let him go.”

“Knew there’d be something that would get through to you,” Grimmson said with a grim smile before it faded as quickly as it had come and his eyes bored into Newt, “But sadly for your furry friend here, this is my message.”

There was a sickening, horrifying _crack_ and suddenly Monty wasn’t moving anymore.

“NO!” Tears flooded Newt’s eyes as he lunged again, trying to get to the cat, to get at Grimmson, to do _something_...but nothing worked as the crushing grips on him tightened tenfold and he sagged uselessly in their restraining arms. His voice came out as a hoarse, broken whisper as he looked up at Grimmson with watering, hate-filled, grief-stricken eyes. “You bastard, you utter bastard...”

“I hope this clarifies matters,” Grimmson replied. “Now what was that you were saying about my money?”

Newt choked on each breath he took and looked over to the remaining yet still very much vulnerable creatures all about his flat and then to the dead, lifeless eyes that would surely accompany those of Theo Peverell in his dreams and then dropped his head. “I spent some of it, rent and other such expenses, the rest is in a private account that I’ll need a day or two to access.”

Grimmson watched him for a few moments longer before he reached forward and roughly patted Newt’s cheek but wisely removed that hand before Newt could take a chunk out of it like he wanted to.

“Now Scamander, I’m going to give you twenty-four hours to get me that money and if you disappoint me, my companions will return and burn down your flat along with any vermin that may still be residing within it. Be it human or animal.”

“I’ll get you what’s left, I swear it,” Newt breathed, his chest heaving, body aching and heart breaking. “Please, just don’t hurt anyone else.”

One of the thugs holding Newt scoffed, “For Christ’s sake, boy, it’s just a fecking cat. If boss’ friend had his way, you’d be chopped up in little bits.”

Newt threw his elbow back and whilst it glanced off the man's hip instead of his stomach, it still elicited a hard knee into his already injured back, prompting a gasping scream from the zoologist as the firecracker sensation flared up his spine. He was promptly dropped, rolled and gagged once more, this time with a stray sock that was jammed in his mouth and secured with another length of tape. The thick wad of musty-tasting material prompted Newt to gag around it, almost choking but managing to steady his erratic breathing with the mortal incentive to do so.

“Now, Scamander, here’s what I’m going to do,” Grimmson picked up Newt’s phone from where it had been lying forgotten on the bed until now and flicked it on, tapping a few times until and smirked slightly and murmured mockingly, “What a popular boy you are.” Then he grew serious once more, “As I was saying, I’m going to leave you here to think on your sins a bit, maybe learn to curb that mouth of yours while you’re at it.” Newt glared but remained silent; not that he had much choice in the matter as Grimmson continued, “But I’m not completely heartless, I’m going to give someone in your contacts list a call and see if they’ll come give you a hand, how about that, eh?”

Newt made a noise of protest behind the tape and Grimmson's smile widened as his thumb hovered over the screen, “How about the last person who called you? Surely they’d be willing to help you out of the sticky little situation you’ve found yourself in.”

Newt let out another muffled string of protests that went ignored as Grimmson hit call, Newt was too far away to hear the voice that answered but he heard Grimmson's words loud and clear: “Hello, I’m afraid that Newt can’t come to the phone right now as he’s had a rather terrible accident in his apartment. Bruises, sprains and blood by the looks of it. Horrible mess.”

He hung up before whoever he had called could reply and smirked nastily down at the felled zoologist. “Now, I really hope you take this more seriously than you did last time. I’d hate for any more fine young students to go missing in this city. The police might start to think they have a real problem on their hands.”

The group went to leave, closing the door behind them, taking what little cash Newt had had and leaving him with the corpse of a dear friend lying motionless and dead-eyed on his bedroom floor. He couldn’t keep his eyes off him, feeling the warmth of tears coursing down his cheeks as he tried to work the tape from his wrists, to get to Monty and see if there was anything he could do, the hope that it might not be too late still burning his chest and throat worse than the injuries inflicted upon him. There was a part of him that knew it was already too late, the old proverb about nine lives wasn’t worth a damn bit of good now. And all Newt could do was lie there on his side, helpless as he waited for whoever Grimmson had called to help get him out of this mess.

He tried not to think of who it could be but his mind flickered back anyway, trying to remember if the last call he’d received had been from Albus, Gellert, Queenie or Jared. But for the life of him, his grief-hazed mind couldn’t manage it and he resorted to slowly, painfully working himself up to lean against the bed beside where Monty lay, resting his head against the cat’s still warm body and letting his tears soak the soft grey fur. 

Newt couldn’t have said how long he lay there but his silent grief was finally interrupted quite a long time later when someone knocked on the door, three firm knocks that had urgency to them but not the panicked hammering he might’ve expected from either Jared or Queenie after having received a message like the one Grimmson had spoken. However, he did feel shock pierce through the miserable fog of his mind when he heard a different voice from any that he had been expecting.

“Newt? Is everything alright? I just received a call saying you’d had an accident.”

Newt made a slight noise behind the tape, not quite an answer but it seemed enough for Graves to try the handle and Newt wasn’t sure if he was relieved or not when the detective found it unlocked. He stepped in cautiously, dark leather shoes coming into view as he moved forward and Newt tore his swollen eyes away from Monty’s still form to look over at Graves.

“Shit,” The detective swore lowly as he caught sight of Newt and hurried forward, crouching down next to the distraught zoologist, his dark eyes wide with concern and shock as he gently tore the tape away from Newt’s mouth, the younger man wincing as his jaw cramped and ached abysmally when Graves extricated the sock from out behind his teeth too. He focussed on breathing in and out for a while longer as Graves then took a heavy-duty pen-knife from his jacket pocket – Newt did _not_ have it in him to question _that_ right now – and began to efficiently saw through the thick layers of tape binding his wrists. He was free in under a minute and gingerly brought his hands around in front of him with a wince and a low moan as his entire upper body protested the movement. His hands lay limply in his lap as Newt’s eyes were drawn inevitably back to Monty and it was only when Graves’ hands came forward to carefully support his own, gently massaging his wrists and fingers to bring life back into them before Newt looked directly at the man.

Graves’ eyes were darker than usual, furious and worried past anything Newt had witnessed in them before and it surprised him enough that he didn’t pull away from the other man’s grip as he usually would’ve. It was only then that Graves spoke properly for the first time since he’d entered, “Now are you going to tell me what happened or should I wait to hear that you’re the next corpse I’m going to have to look at.” 

Newt flinched and Graves dark brows knitted as he exhaled a breath, “Shit, sorry, I know, I think I’m just getting a little invested in you as you seem to be cropping up everywhere around me right now.”

“Try the other way around,” Newt mumbled but with no real energy to it, it prompted a small smile from the detective, however, and though the grim, suddenly steady aura to him remained, he seemed less verging on the edge of panic. He could feel Graves eyes taking in every bruise and mark visible on Newt and roving over his jacketed form, clearly searching for more. “I’m fine.”

“Sure you are,” Graves replied dismissively, “Coat off.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Coat off, now, and your sweater too while you’re at it.”

“I told you, I’m perfectly-”

“Newt, I know the signs of a good beating and you’re hunched over like a ninety-year-old man, please just save yourself some pain and both of us some time by doing as I say. I can help you and I’m sure you probably don’t want to be answering any questions tonight about how you ended up like this.”

Newt stared a few seconds longer before he sighed and began shucking his layers of clothing, feeling an awful similarity to the aftermath of the last time he had come into contact with Grimmson and absently wondering if were stuck in some horrible time loop or holding pattern of events. And whether he’d ever recover from it.

It was only as Graves was helping him get his shirt off over his injured shoulders that Newt spoke up again, eyes fixed once more on Monty.

“He’s dead, isn’t he?”

He heard a quiet, sad-sounding sigh as Graves moved around behind him.

“Yes.”

Newt’s head lowered and he pressed his swollen, stinging eyes shut, his voice coming out a hoarse whisper once more, “It's my fault. I shouldn’t have provoked them.”

“Probably not,” Graves agreed quietly. “But it’s not your fault.” 

“You don’t know what happened.”

“Maybe I don’t, but I also know that the sort of person who goes around beating innocent people and killing their cats isn’t likely to need much provocation to do something terrible.” 

Newt blinked but was quickly distracted by the hands that began palpitating his shoulder and he muffled a scream as he jerked forward, “Ah ah ha! That’s rather…ah sensitive.”

“Looks it,” Graves grunted, his fingers testing an area around Newt’s shoulder blade and this time the zoologist couldn’t control the sound of agony that escaped him as he curled over into himself, breathing hard. “I could be wrong, but some of this bruising looks older than it should do. Has someone been hurting you?”

“No,” Newt murmured, “Well, yes, I suppose but not in the way you’re thinking it.”

“That it was the much older, evidently manipulative man that you’re spending your time with?” Graves snapped but before Newt could protest, Graves continued with a weary sigh, “No, I don’t think it was him, because as much as he is a dangerous man to be around, he isn’t this…careless.”

“Sorry…what?”

“He knows how to inflict pain of the deepest proportions without leaving a single mark on your skin and this has the work of pure thuggery written all over it.”

Newt decided, very pointedly, to ignore the issue at hand concerning Graves’ evident detective streak coming through and instead said, “Look, would you mind please just telling me whatever issue it is that you have with Gellert? I thought he was your consultant, I thought he helped you.”

Graves snorted but quickly composed himself, his fingers running along Newt’s collarbone from behind, gently pressing and prodding, most likely testing for fractures or breaks. “He did, for a time, then some things stopped making sense around him. For the longest time,” Graves paused as he tilted Newt’s head from one side to the other, the zoologist wincing slightly but the detective seeming unworried by what he found as he hands moved lower, testing each prominent rib on a gradually descending trajectory. “I thought he was honest. He was smart – brilliant, really, charming, hospitable and insightful.” He huffed a breath as his hands brushed over Newt’s lower ribs, “But it took me too long, _far_ too long, before I realised that he was deceiving me. Deceiving us all, and that he could not be trusted.”

“I’m afraid that you’ll have to be more specific than that if you’re going to start levelling accusations at anyone,” Newt muttered, still staring straight ahead, dead-eyed and despondent.

“Well, not to rile you, but had I thought it was a good idea to give you specifics, I would have already.”

“And I suppose that you’re not going to tell me why that is either?”

“No,” came the somewhat expected reply just as Graves finished off his checks and straightened, standing and looking about the room in a cursory manner before looking back to Newt. “I don’t suppose you have a first-aid kit anywhere do you?”

Newt was about to shake his head before he remembered that he had in fact bought back-up supplies of bandages after his first run-in with Grimmson, under Gellert’s advisement and he made to stand to get them, quickly realising, however, what a tremendously terrible idea that was and accepting Graves’s help as he was guided over to the sofa and plopped down there in favour of sitting on the bed beside his recently deceased friend. God, he couldn’t just leave him there. What sort of friend or zoologist was he if he just watched an innocent creature under his protection be murdered and then just left him on Newt’s bed like an odd sock? He deserved better.

Graves must’ve caught his stare as he placed a bracing hand on Newt’s shoulder, “I’m sorry for your loss... What was his name?”

“Monty.”

“Good name,” Graves smiled a bit as he began to wind the lengths of bandages around most of Newt’s upper body, probably not as neatly as Gellert might’ve done it but a good enough strapping to help support Newt’s injuries all the same. “Got any whiskey?”

“Um, no, I don’t think so, but I do have some rubbing alcohol somewhere around here, I think-"

He cut himself off as Graves released a huff of barely amused air, “Not for cleaning wounds with, more a toast to your friend.”

“Oh.”

Newt hadn’t thought of that.

“Might’ve taken the edge off the pain too though, I’m not sure if aspirin is going to cut it.”

“I told you already, it doesn’t hurt that bad.”

“That’s the shock talking,” Graves told him bluntly, “I think that your shoulder blade is definitely cracked, certainly felt that way anyway. Was the guy wearing steel toecap boots?”

“Why, can you see the boot-print?” Newt asked, a little bitterly and Graves offered him a mild expression.

“A little bit, yeah.”

Newt sighed and this time when he stood, Graves did not try to stop him as the zoologist stiffly, slowly made his way back over to the bed and gently, oh so gently, picked up Monty’s still form, cradling the cat to his bare chest and looking around the room more than a little hopelessly. He felt useless simply sitting there, disrespectful and disregarding of his friend’s death by allowing his paltry-in-comparison wounds to be tended to. He was not about to call a vet or animal services to deal with the body, no, not with the amount of dubiously allowable creatures that lived in his flat, it also felt like he would be shunting his responsibility onto someone else. Which he was not prepared to do.

Helga and Frederick came over and began rubbing themselves in and around Newt’s legs, he looked down at them sadly and whilst part of him wanted to actively comfort the cats, he still couldn’t bring himself to let go of Monty. Instead, he crouched down amongst them and made soft sounds as Frederick pressed his squished-looked, one-eyed face into Monty’s fur, rubbing and seeming as if he were trying to wake him up. Tears began to slide down the zoologists face once more but he didn’t make a sound, simply remaining on the floor with all three felines huddled around him, both living and dead. His eyes drifted to the kitchen as he heard a familiar scritch-scratching of claws on wood as Lila pushed her way up out of her little burrow hole under the loose floorboard. The very same place Newt had stored the money, wrapped carefully in plastic and placed in a small satchel to keep it as safe as the small fox that dwelled there. He gave her a watery smile and then glanced over at Graves’ bemused expression as he watched the limping fox cub emerge from her hidey-hole in the floor by his feet. She must’ve been there already when Grimmson arrived and not have been inclined to leave what with all the noisy, stomping, marauding humans. Newt had suspected that was where she was hiding and hadn’t wanted to risk the thugs finding her, especially if she got between them and the money she had been curled around. 

Graves was watching him again, he was digging around in Newt’s cabinets and drawers in the kitchen but he was still evidently observing Newt in sidelong glances and those looks were more than a little concerned. God, how had it gotten to the point in this never-ending, awful, awful night that he was allowing Graves into his home and accepting help and comfort from the man? He was practically a bloody menace.

It was then that it occurred to him, “Why are you here in the first place?”

Graves looked at him oddly, pulling a pack of paracetamol from one cupboard and a rather old bottle of cider from the back of Newt’s fridge, “I told you, I got a call from your phone.”

“But how? Why? Gr-…he said that he had called the last number that called me. You weren’t one of them.” He then remembered the unknown number that had called him amongst the known ones and looked at Graves with suspicion, “You were the blocked caller, weren’t you? How did you get my number?” Graves looked a touch sheepish as he stood before Newt with the bottle in one hand and paracetamol in the other, clearly wanting to pass them over but Newt found that his arms were still locked around Monty and he couldn’t seem to find it in him to let go even as he stared the detective down.

“Jared gave it to me. I told him I wanted to apologise for how we got on before.”

“So you lied.”

“No,” Graves looked frustrated, like he wanted to snap at Newt but was holding back for sake of the younger man’s current state, “It was the truth.”

“I’m yet to hear it.”

“I’m sorry.” And he sounded it too, though that may well have had more to do with his abused, distraught state than any real intent but Newt wasn’t in any mood to argue on it.

“Well, if it helps, I’m sorry too.”

“What for?”

“Well, for one thing, I suppose I wasn’t very nice to you the first time we met and then you got dragged into-” he glanced around his bombshell-hit-it-look of a flat “-this.”

“Not a problem, beats insomnia, drinking alone and looking at pictures of corpses all night.”

Strangely enough, Newt doubted he was joking, “I suppose it would.”

Graves eyes dropped to the furry bundle in Newt’s arms and asked softly, “What do you want to do with him?”

“Bury him, I suppose, though I somehow doubt that my landlord will approve of having a cat buried in the bit of grass up front.”

“Probably not,”

Newt might’ve suggested the park on another night, could think of plenty of places within it where Monty could be put to rest without ruining the scenery or riling too many authorities. But the thought of burying him in the same place that had seen what had been done to Theo Peverell – on the very same night, nonetheless - seemed to wrong to even consider. Instead, Newt sat back down on the bed, still cradling Monty to him and eyes losing track of the room around him as they slipped from focus.

Graves’ voice cut through his stupor not long later as he suggested: “I know a place near where I grew up, the Castleknock area, there’s a field, big and rather beautiful but it doesn’t get too much foot traffic…if that would be alright?”

Newt’s head jerked up, eyes still not quite focussing but ears attuned to the sincerity in each word as it was spoken and eventually, he nodded, standing once more and instinctively moving toward the door before Graves placed a hand on his bare shoulder and the zoologist remembered that he was half-naked still. He carefully placed Monty down back on the bed and grabbed a clean shirt from his wardrobe, a long-sleeved, stretchy beige one that he could fit over the layers of bandages wrapped around him, he painfully managed his coat and scarf but didn’t bother trying any more layers as he didn’t think his protesting, stiff body could handle it. Graves handed him a mug of water and the painkillers which he took more out of habit than any desire for the pain to stop. It was proving too much of an adequate distraction from his inner turmoil to pass up. He used some of the water and an old tea-towel to wipe the blood from around his lips and cheek, wincing a bit as he did so, his cheek felt stiff, as if the skin had tightened in response to the abuse it had received and the corner of his lip stung whenever he opened his mouth. 

“Are you going to be okay on my bike?” Graves asked before glancing over to Monty. “And I think we should probably get something to carry him in.”

Newt nodded, going over to the coat hooks and grabbing his old rucksack, a battered khaki-green thing that had belonged to Theseus once upon a time, alongside a foldable metal trowel. He gently picked Monty up and placed him in it, zipping it up and trying to ignore the way the heavy, still slightly warm weight of the cat felt against the side of his leg as he held the bag close. He and Graves left the flat, Newt making sure to lock the door this time and they went outside, Newt taking in deep, slow breaths of fresh night air. It was late now, he couldn’t have said how late but after having been asleep for two days, he felt more awake now than he should have, and the more sensible, cautious part of him did not question mounting the back of Graves’ Harley, taking a helmet from him or even placing his arms around the other man’s waist to keep steady as they pulled out onto the road and began heading north-west. He clung on tighter than was perhaps necessary, every part of him aching at the force but it felt better than maintaining the tenuous grip his doubts about Graves would have called for.

It wasn’t a long journey, not when Graves swerved through the meagre late-night traffic with practised speed and ease, gaining a few honks from angry drivers but otherwise passing unencumbered. Everything seemed different from the back of a bike, moving fast but still feeling the wind against you and the sights and scents washing over in a way that he hadn’t experienced before. They reached their destination after maybe twenty minutes, Graves coming to a halt by the side of a low brick wall along a darker area of a suburban street. There were terraced brick houses lined up facing the wall but beyond it, Newt could see a large, blank stretch of grass, a bit tufty but clearly maintained enough so that people might walk across it. Tall trees lined every side of it and something of a dark body of water, a river it seemed, glistening in the light of the houses and the moon at the other end of the field.

“Do you...think this is good enough? For a burial, mean.” Graves sounded almost vulnerable then, apprehensive, as if he were truly worried about Newt’s answer. The zoologist looked down to the canvas bag cradled so carefully in his arms and then up to Graves again and offered him a soft, genuinely grateful smile.

“Yes, I think it's perfect.” 

They made their way forward, Graves helping Newt over the wall with just about the right amount of support before they started trekking through the grass, Newt trusting that Graves knew where they were going and the older man not attempting to make uncomfortable small talk. It was at the furthest edge of the field, down in the copse of trees that were growing from a shallow dip just beyond the waterline that Graves stopped. Newt looked along the rows of trees, eyes seeking out into the darkness and it suddenly occurred to him that going out into a dark, secluded area in the middle of the night with Graves may not have been the best idea considering Newt’s track record as of late. But then again, after a night like this, perhaps being murdered and buried in a field wouldn’t be quite so bad after all. He found himself hoping, perhaps a little morbidly, that Graves might think to bury Monty near him to if that was his intent.

Newt set the backpack to one side for the time being, taking the trowel out, unfolding it and he began to dig, his shoulders seized after the first thirty seconds but he carried on regardless, carried on digging until his whole body was alit with a searing, burning ache. But once again, the pain proved an effective deterrent for the grief, guilt, confusion, horror and anger that was gnawing at the corners of his fraying mind. He might’ve dug a little too long. By the time he stopped, it was only because Graves’ hand had clasped his wrist, halting his frantic movements and carefully taking the trowel from Newt’s shaking, bloody, muddy fingers.

Graves didn’t let go straight away and Newt felt as though his eyes were burning him, the young man not looking up but continually down. Down into the darkness of the hole he had created. The tears did not come this time, however, his eyes felt wide, swollen and dry. It was with numb fingers that he reached over and slowly unzipped the rucksack, he eased the top section of it back and picked up the limp body inside, carefully placing the empty shell that had been Monty into the hole. His fingers stroked briefly through the fur around the top of his head, ruffling it very slightly in the way the cat used to like before he let go.

Graves said nothing as they filled the grave together and Newt was grateful for it. He didn’t know what he would’ve said or what Graves might’ve, or even what he really wanted to hear. He contented himself with the quiet sounds of running water and the soft pat of cold earth beneath his fingertips.

Newt probably shouldn’t have been surprised as the darkness encroached his vision and he felt himself falling forward.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thoughts? Desires? Feedback?


	12. I ask your eyes

_23 rd \- 24th October _

It wasn’t a particularly easy task to lug Newt’s unconscious form back over the field or to make the decision that calling an ambulance was his best port of call but as he sat in the waiting room outside the emergency room that the young man had been taken into, he knew that he’d made the right decision. The lad was beaten badly and had passed out from what he suspected was a potent combination of stress, pain and probably exhaustion, judging by the dark smudges under his eyes. When questioned by the paramedics, Graves had made the excuse that Newt had called him after getting jumped in the place that the ambulance had found them and that the zoologist had passed out as Graves had tried to help him up. The lies came easy nowadays, too readily compared to his old standard but he was still sharp of tongue and quick on his feet when the situation called for it.

He could’ve said the lad fell, like the smug, lying asshole on the phone had told him, but the bruises of the beating and the tape marks left on his skin hinted too strongly towards a more sinister explanation for the EMTs to buy that it had been accidental. Now, what exactly Newt had gotten himself mixed up in that put him in such a state was another matter entirely. Graves had made a promise to himself from the moment he had seen that puffy-eyed, bruised, bloody, gagged face peeking from a nest of bed sheets and copper curls, that he would find whoever did this and nail their asses to the wall. What sort of monsters reduced someone to a state like that and then brutally broke his pet's neck in front of him? It was barbaric, sadistic, but also not the direct work of Grindelwald. When he'd received the call from Newt’s phone, he had grimly expected it to be some sick game of Grindelwald’s and that Graves was doomed to find Newt’s mutilated corpse strung up in the lad's own flat. The reality had been both a relief and a horror to behold.

Some chatty nurse had brought him a cup of coffee as he settled down to wait, not the machine stuff either, proper brewed coffee that must’ve come from the breakroom. He’d smiled and offered her quiet thanks, but she had still walked away looking disappointed somehow. Graves wasn’t ignorant of the effect he sometimes had on women but it always ended up being easier to simply be polite and impersonal rather than pretending that he was interested; she seemed nice enough but getting involved with anyone was something fraught with danger and disappointment for Graves. Jared was evidence enough of that. He’d meant every word of the apology he’d offered the Texan but there was still no way he was going to become seriously involved with the younger man with Grindelwald lingering around the city, most especially when he now had potential leverage on Graves in the forms of both Jared and the junior Scamander.

The revelation of Newt’s familial relation to an old colleague of his just added another tick on the checklist of reasons why Grindelwald was interested in the lad – he was looking for vengeance on Theseus for his role in helping Graves hound him. Back in 2009, when Grindelwald had been in London, and Graves had sought out Theseus’ help and advice on a murder investigation. Though they’d never been exactly close, Graves and Theseus worked well together. It had only been years later, after Graves had met Grindelwald and figured out his true nature, that he had begun to connect the similarities between the murders he had investigated with Theseus. The skin cocooning element had been the thing that most people focussed on but little to no interest was given to the highly skilled precision with which the killer used a blade, selecting only the healthiest organs. The organs that would fit in one of Grindelwald’s macabre feasts and dinner parties, presented and prepared to perfection to hide the true butchery of their origins. Graves had been the one to suggest, over a decade prior, that the killer was not only a surgeon but a master of the culinary arts, a narcissist and, though his cannibalistic tastes might warrant a reclusive nature, that he still indulged his narcissism by hosting and serving what he had created to others. Revelling in their obliviousness. Just because the earlier victims hadn’t been cocooned didn’t mean they weren’t still his victims 

Whilst Theseus had initially been dubious of Graves’ warnings of the danger that the murderous doctor represented, they had still worked alongside each other for nearly three months, trying to find a way of exposing the killer. Though they had largely been unsuccessful and Theseus had eventually relinquished his tenacious energy for catching the White Spider, for the sake of his family, Graves had assumed at the time it was solely Theseus’ wife and son that he had been concerned for.

Now, thinking of the obvious similarities between Newt and Grindelwald’s usual type of victim, Graves could understand why Theseus had backed off when one of the London bodies had turned up less than a block from his home. It had been a warning. Graves couldn’t be sure if Grindelwald had been aware of Newt at the time or if he’d only started pursuing the young man since he came to Dublin. The Brit would have only been about fifteen or sixteen then and it made Graves shudder to imagine what Grindelwald might’ve done to him. Had Newt been the reason the doctor came here in the first place or was it merely coincidence? The White Spider was patient but somehow, Graves couldn’t see Grindelwald waiting around for over a decade to make his move on Newt.

It was all a lot to consider and tonight had been long enough already; he felt a thrill of relief when one nurse emerged from the ward Newt was in and told him that the young man was awake, sedated but somewhat agitated and wanted to talk to him. He stood stiffly from the hard wooden bench and followed after the young blonde woman in lilac scrubs, going through two sets of double doors and then into a large but quiet ward which housed four rows of beds, of which only about a quarter were occupied.

Newt was on the furthest side by the windows and he was sitting up in bed, the light blue, paper sheets pulled up to his waist and a drip in one arm. He’d had surgery then. Graves wasn’t all that surprised. With the fractures he’d suspected dotted around the man’s upper body, it was inevitable that some of them might need deeper treatment. The zoologist’s right arm was bound in a cloth sling, the same wrist was dressed too, the cut on his cheek stitched, yet more bandages showing around the collar of the hospital-issue blue gown and some sort of ointment was smeared over his swollen eye. All in all, he certainly looked like he’d seen better days.

He still had the energy to glare at Graves when he spotted his approach. Newt barely waited until after the nurse had drawn the curtain around them and left before he spoke his mind.

“Why did you bring me here?”

Graves regarded him mildly, hands in his suit trouser pockets and posture straight. “In all fairness, I didn’t. Technically, I only called an ambulance after you passed out on me. _They_ were the ones that decided having been beaten to a pulp and sporting broken bones warranted proper medical attention.” 

Newt shifted a little in the bed and winced before his posture sagged that bit more and he sighed, closing his eyes tight shut for a few moments before opening them again and looking up at Graves with pained eyes. “I can’t afford this. I don’t have a health card and I don’t have the money to be here.”

Graves’ eyes widened, he hadn’t thought of that, “You don’t have anyone you could ask for help? Medical emergencies usually trump petty squabbles and pride here, Newt.”

Newt’s brows knitted in a deeper frown as he all but snapped, “If I had someone to go to for money, none of this would’ve happened in the first place.”

Graves’ own expression darkened at the admittance, “It was a loan shark that did this? Someone who you went to for money?” Newt looked around furtively before inclining his head in a minute nod and Graves fought back a groan. “Why not go to your brother for help?”

“He couldn’t afford it. And even if he could, do you really know Theseus so little that you think he wouldn’t hold this over me for the rest of my life? Not even as a matter of pride but simply because he told me coming here and doing this degree was a bad idea from the very beginning. He would try to get me to move back to London and give up on my degree to do something that he approved of instead. I’m not going to abandon my life because of a run of frankly awful luck.” 

Thinking of what the elder Scamander was like and the fact that he had seemingly been so protective of Newt that he’d never even mentioned the existence of a brother to Graves in the time he’d known him, he found himself understanding the lad’s fear. But it didn’t stop him being frustrated at both men’s stubbornness and when he spoke, his voice was a fervent murmur, “Newt, I don’t think that you’ll be able to have much of a life if you’re beaten to death by loan sharks first.”

Newt ducked his head, apparently not having a response to that but then something evidently occurred to him and his head snapped, glancing to first the slowly brightening window and then to Graves “What time is it?”

Graves checked his watch “Quarter to six.”

“Bugger,” Newt muttered and Graves quirked a brow.

“I’m sure that your lecturers won’t have a problem with you skipping class because you’re in the hospital.”

“That’s not it,” Newt refuted and Graves watched him a few moments more before it clicked.

“You’ve got a timeframe to give those bastards back their money?”

“Yes, and now I have less than sixteen hours left to transfer money from an account that requires a minimum twenty-four hours’ notice.”

“That does sound like a profoundly more difficult situation,” Graves conceded slowly before adding “One might almost think it would be a good idea to go to the police for help.”

Newt gave him a withering though slightly more tolerant look than he might’ve expected “I somehow doubt that going to illegal sources for money, being recently involved in a gruesome murder investigation and having a past criminal record is exactly the best basis to involve the police.”

Graves’ brows rose “Point taken.”

“I need to get out of here,” Newt muttered, seemingly to himself and he was reaching over to press the call button for the nurse when Graves caught his uninjured wrist gently, knowing that the stubborn man would probably drive himself into the ground if he left now.

“You need to _heal_ , Newt.” He said firmly “You have some rather serious injuries there and I don’t think that the professionals would recommend you attempting to leave right now either.”

“What choice do I have?” Newt snapped at him, eyes fierce and glimmering with something that looked like a deeper pain than merely the physical “They’re going to burn down my flat and kill everyone inside and even if that somehow is _miraculously avoided_ , they’re not going to stop.”

Graves’ eyes widened as the full gravity of the situation fell on him “How the hell did you even get involved with people like this in the first place?” Newt looked down at where Graves’ hand was still gripping his wrist but neither made to move. He could feel the younger man’s slightly too fast pulse thrumming against his fingertips and fought the urge to rub gently against it in an attempt to calm him – it would likely only make the lad uncomfortable. And he desperately didn’t want that.

“Through a friend of mine, I’m sure Jared has probably mentioned Queenie at some point.”

Graves nodded in recognition “She was the other witness listed in the report of the body you found.” At Newt’s searching look, he expounded “I got to grips with the case better after you left.”

Newt nodded absently “She recommended Grimmson when it got to the point where I would’ve been evicted and destitute had I not gone to him. All of my creatures would have starved.” Newt shuddered, seemingly still highly affected by the thought and Graves could understand why what with the looming threat that this ‘Grimmson’ and his lackeys posed to both Newt and his zoological roommates. “The first time I met him was how I ended running into Gellert – believe it or not, he saved me that night.”

“I’ll bet he did,” Graves muttered under his breath, so low that not even the zoologist heard before clearing his throat and saying aloud “Still seems an odd contact for your friend to have.”

“My thoughts exactly but I suppose it doesn’t much matter now anyway,” Newt sighed before carefully extricating himself from Graves’ grip and readjusting his sling slightly with the newly freed hand “Don’t suppose you know where my phone went? I’ll need it to transfer the money over.”

“I’m guessing the nurses will have put it with your other belongings, I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“Could you- ah, could you get me some tea too while you’re out? Please? I’m terribly parched,” Newt’s eyes were fixed on the off-blue curtain behind Graves’ head as he spoke but hearing the huskier than usual element to the student’s voice, the elder took sympathy.

He nodded and left in search of a nurse to ask though kept an eye on the lad over his shoulder just in case he was planning on trying something as stupid as getting out of bed when he clearly was in no shape to do so. It took him longer than he’d hoped to flag down a nurse who was willing to stop to talk to him long enough to help him. When he finally did, she very helpfully told him that all patients belongings were in fact kept in the cabinets beside their beds and that Newt should have already been informed of this when he awoke.

Graves growled under his breath and strode back through the halls until he got to the correct ward and fixed the slowly rising zoologist with a stern, disapproving look. The lad had his phone out and pressed to his ear, expression inscrutable but when he spotted the detective’s return and ire, he hastened to wrap up whatever conversation he’d been having sharpish. “Yes, thank you, that would be brilliant.”

Graves stepped very deliberately up in front of Newt and crossed his arms over his chest “Any particular reason you felt the need to send me off on a wild goose chase around the hospital?”

Newt looked up at him a little sheepishly through his fringe though didn’t make the mistake of trying to stand or move past Graves “I, ahm, didn’t realise it was here until it started ringing?”

Graves gave him an utterly withering look “Who did you call? And why did you feel the need to hide it from me?”

Newt’s eyes narrowed slightly at that “I very much appreciate your help and everything that you’ve done for me tonight but I still don’t feel as though you have any right to be demanding to know everything going on in my life like this.”

“Newt,” the detective half-growled the younger man’s name before he took a deep breath, forcing himself to be calm. “Just please don’t tell me you decided to call this Grimmson and ask for more time because I can’t imagine that it would end well.”

“No, no I didn’t.” suddenly, Newt seemed to find a great deal of difficulty looking anywhere but at his own bare feet. A cold feeling of dread settled into Grave’ stomach like lead.

“Newt, who did you call?”

“I didn’t call anyone,” Newt protested before clarifying at the darkening look on Graves’ face “Gellert called me.”

Graves let his eyes slip closed momentarily, exhaling through his nose as he rubbed a hand over his eyes. When he opened them again, his voice sounded about as tired as he felt “Let me guess, he offered to help you?”

Newt’s eyes narrowed a fraction “Why do you say that like it’s a bad thing?”

“Don’t you think it’s strange that always seems to be around whenever you need help? A little convenient maybe? First, he saves you from Grimmson and his lackeys and now he happens to call at the exact right time to be useful?”

Newt shrugged “Twice isn’t that much of a coincidence, besides, I failed to call him back before, it's not all that strange that he’d think to call again.”

Graves sighed in irritation. “What did he have to say?”

“Nothing that should much matter to you, I’m afraid,” came the short reply before his eyes dropped down to where his hand was clenching and unclenching as if it wanted to fiddle with the bandaged one but was fighting against the impulse. “Thank you for…for coming to help me when you did.”

Graves’ jaw tightened slightly but his eyes softened as he looked at the younger man “You should probably more be thanking me for not calling your brother.”

Newt chuckled hoarsely “Definitely.”

The hoarse sound reminded Graves that he’d neglected to fetch the tea the student had asked for and whilst he was still fairly sure it had been a ruse, it still sounded as though Newt could use it. “I’m getting you that tea but I swear to god that if you try to get out of this bed while I’m gone, I will tell your brother everything.”

Newt held up one hand in mock surrender “Alright, fine, I’ll stay put.”

“You better.”

Graves left and had to go to the next floor up to finding a working machine, pressing the button for tea and wincing slightly as the sludgy excuse for a beverage came out of the spout into the Styrofoam cup. The chatty nurse from before stopped in her rounds to talk to him and he was caught up for nearly four gruellingly awkward minutes before he made the excuse of the tea getting cold and escaped quickly down the hall and into the elevator. It wasn’t until he was just past the doors of the ward Newt was in that he heard the awfully familiar tones of a voice speaking softly, coaxingly to another and he realised what a grave mistake he’d made by leaving the room in the first place.

As he approached the curtained bed at the end of the room his suspicions were soon confirmed. Newt was no longer alone, sitting there now with a black military-style coat folded neatly on his lap and his arm wrapped possessively around a hospital-robed waist was the person Graves had wanted to see least of all right now. Probably ever. He was speaking quietly into the zoologist’s ear, lips hovering inches from it and lids partly lowered over those creepy as hell eyes. 

Those eyes focused on him once he drew too close to reasonably ignore, half-crushing the cup of tea in one hand and he drew away from Newt’s ear only slightly, still hovering close and obviously protective - or possessive might be a better word for it – as the White Spider addressed Graves with a practised and flawless deception “Detective Graves, I must thank you for taking such diligent care of Newt here but I believe that I would be more qualified to handle him from here on in.”

* * *

Despite Grimmson’s almost utter failure to follow Gellert’s instructions, the doctor still found himself holding a trembling, very much malleable and vulnerable Newt to his side and the boy’s injuries provided the perfect excuse to implement the next part of his plan. Though he would have to take more care than he may have originally intended both due to Grimmson’s recklessness and Graves’ current presence. Newt did not seem bothered by it but Gellert wasn’t about to let the detective get in the way of his intentions towards the young man currently cradled at his side.

He waited patiently as Newt chose to speak up for himself, looking up at Graves with a thin smile “I really shouldn’t keep you any longer. You should probably get to work or maybe get some sleep, you look awfully tired.”

Graves’ dark brows furrowed “This coming from the man who just underwent hours of surgery to fix a fractured shoulder blade and collarbone.” 

“Well, they did put me out for it so at least I got some sleep there, I suppose.” He tried for a smile again and Graves’ stubbornness seemed to crack and flake away like dry pastry under the boy’s watery blue-green eyes. The detective’s eyes slid to Gellert swiftly, however, and hardened once more into something closer to the impressively stoic and powerful demeanour he once held; the one that Gellert had relished in watching crumble and falter. Left in the past like so much of the ash and blood that filled it, formed it.

“Can I speak with you for a moment, Doctor? In private?” Graves was looking at him and despite his reluctance to relinquish Newt, he nodded and did exactly that, his hand lingering on Newt’s arm a moment longer as if in reassurance, before following the detective out of the room. Graves led them down the hallway and into a quieter section, a place with plastic chairs and the sort of dreadful fake plants and year-old magazines that only belonged in hospital waiting rooms. He was admittedly curious as to what the American would have to say. Warn him off? Threaten him? Perhaps even finally try to kill him again? He would be disappointed on all fronts if that were his intention but Graves surprised him by merely fixing him with a hard stare for some moments before he spoke.

“Did you tell Grimmson to go as far as he did or have you merely got a wild dog on an ever-straining leash?” Gellert offered him a wholly unimpressed look – as if he were going to admit anything like that aloud. He hadn’t got this far in life, with what he did, by agreeing readily to any accusations levelled his way, no matter how accurate they may be. Graves seemed ready for this, however, and smiled grimly. “Thought so. Getting other people to do your dirty work is all well and good but when you’ve got someone like that, I think it more often than not results in you having too many loose ends to tie up further down the line.” Graves’ expression darkened “But I don’t believe that there’s any point in me trying to remind you of the moral qualms of your actions either as it’s never seemed to bother you in past.”

“Your logic is sound, I suppose, though I’m afraid that I couldn’t possibly fathom what ‘dirty work’ of mine you might be referring to.” Gellert’s brow arched delicately as he continued, his tone dropping into one of a more goading nature “Between the two of us, I believe the ill will would more likely be found in the way you have deliberately kept your disenfranchised state of affairs from Newt and led him to believe that you are in more of a position to help him than you truly are. Giving false hope, seems to me, the much crueller thing.” 

Graves visibly bristled but there was something in his eyes that Gellert had sought – the fear. The knowledge that Graves kept buried under his newer, brasher, more caustic demeanour; the knowledge that he was that much more helpless than he had been any of the other times that Graves had faced Grindelwald. He was worn down both emotionally and physically by his years of failure. The scar that both knew to cleave the flesh of his abdomen and the near-decade of alcoholism, poor sleep and bodily abuse had all sapped the once proud and well-respected detective of his energy and his power. And the fact that it had been Grindelwald who had done it only affected the detective that much more. The fact that he could fight the same battles over and over in places all over the world, with whatever allies he could convince of his theories, with varying levels of preparedness and still consistently fail…it ate him up inside. Graves wasn’t worth killing simply because he was destroying himself from the inside out just fine on his own. Gellert would once have found some degree of satisfaction in ending Graves as a worthy adversary, as someone who had worked him out when few others had…but he was no longer that man.

Oddly enough, Gellert had seen more of that man in the past few days than he had in years, spotted glimpses of it in their two brief encounters and he couldn’t entirely tell if it was a resolution of Graves’ spirit fortifying or if it was because he thought he had something to fight for. Either way, Gellert intended to use it to his advantage. Not only was Newt the key to Theseus and Albus but now Graves too it seemed. He had an investment in the boy that could not go unexploited. It was simply too perfect an opportunity to pass up.

“If you’ll excuse me, I don’t believe that Newt is in any state to be left alone right now.”

“Oh, but of course, given that he’s involved not only with a psychotic loan shark but now also in the midst of a murder investigation that seems linked to him in too many ways that any rational detective could ignore?”

Gellert raised his brows and offered the detective a politely incredulous expression “I see you have been doing your research. But I’m afraid that I can be hardly blamed for Newt’s life decisions from a time before I even met him, now can I?”

“At this point, I would put little past you,” Graves half-spat and Gellert merely offered him a thin smile before inclining his head minutely towards the other man, then turned on his heel and left. 

As he did so, he couldn’t resist getting in the final word “It would be wise of you to not repeat such aspersions to anyone else, Graves, I’m sure you remember why.”

The silence that followed assure Grindelwald that he most certainly did.

* * *

Newt wasn’t sure at what point he drifted off in the passenger seat of Gellert’s car but he was aware of when he was awoken, Gellert’s thumb stroking softly over his cheekbone, one finger almost lazily brushing over Newt’s lowered lids. Newt smiled into the touch and leant back just enough so that when he opened his eyes, Gellert wouldn’t end up poking them. “Sorry, must be more tired than I thought.”

It had been a light doze for which the zoologist was more than grateful, he knew all too well what would be waiting for him in any deeper levels of sleep. He exited the car and found himself staring up at where Gellert had brought him; the big, imposing house sandwiched between a vacant building with a for sale sign and an equally imposing gothic-arched church, he couldn’t help but feel apprehension rise in him again. But when he thought of returning to his flat tonight, to the place where he had seen Monty die and felt the lifeless form of his friend lying in his trembling arms, where he himself had been beaten into the ground and threatened…no, the place did not feel safe anymore. He felt a deep, clawing, panic-inducing fear, that if he returned now that the same fate would befall all of his creatures; the souls that depended upon him and that he in turn cherished. It might be irrational and selfish and stupid but after Gellert had called and offered him all the support he might need…it felt too easy to allow himself rest, to let that promise simply _be enough._

Gellert let them both in and kept a careful arm around the zoologist, holding him steady as everything around Newt continually felt as though it was shifting, unsolid and intangible. It felt as though he were at sea, on the ice and on shifting sand all at the same time and he found his breaths were coming in too fast, too short and that he wasn’t much aware of anything besides the one point of contact guiding him ever onward. It came as a complete surprise some time later when his eyes refocussed to see that he was now sitting in a bedroom. Not Gellert’s either, no this seemed to be a guest bedroom, with a matching rich blue coverlet and pillows, plain cream walls acting as a continuation of the midnight blue carpet that felt soft and pleasant underneath Newt’s socked feet. When had he taken his shoes off, had he ever put them on? He’d woken in the hospital with only a gown and his underwear on so he supposed that at some point, he must’ve dressed and been discharged by the doctors. For the life of him, however, he couldn’t recall any of it with any definition. Like attempting to remember a dream mere minutes after waking up – the details sliding from his grasp as quickly as he tried to hold onto them. They were there, just not that easy to grab onto. 

He settled onto the side of the bed but the adrenalin and the fear of what was awaiting him on the other side kept from even considering sleeping just yet. He supposed it wasn’t all that crazy that he was feeling awake after nearly two solid days of sleep and being knocked out by anaesthetic that he didn’t even remember being given as he had already been unconscious at the time. His body was probably plenty rested but his mind was more deep-fried than one of Jacob’s Nonnevot. He felt…liquid, liquid that was in a holding pattern, frozen like ice that just had yet to break.

“Newt?” Gellert’s voice sounded oddly far away, echoey and discordant, far away from its usually low, smooth, soothing quality. “Newt? Can you hear me?”

Newt managed to nod, to bob his head in the affirmative but he didn’t think it convinced anyone, not even himself. He heard, he understood but it didn’t feel like him responding, not really. It felt more like a frost-bitten corpse bobbing to the puppet master’s strings. Though who was pulling them, he couldn’t say. He couldn’t even think as his head got lighter and his breaths got shorter.

“Newt, you’re having a panic attack.” 

Oh, was he? He supposed that made sense.

“Yes, it does and right now I need you to breathe for me. In for four, hold for four and then let out for five.”

Newt hadn’t realised he had been speaking aloud but he supposed that he must have and he also thought that he should probably do what Gellert’s voice was saying. He tried.

“Newt, just hold it in a little longer…good, that’s good, now let it out slowly.”

It felt weird, wrong, to breathe that way but it also got him more focussed upon his body and the way it was moving, the pain flowing through it rather than his inner turmoil. If only for a little while. He let it happen, let Gellert’s voice guide him back into the present.

“Now, Newt, can you try opening your eyes for me?”

Open them? He hadn’t even realised that they were pressed tight shut until that moment. When he did, he was met with true blue close to his and his voice sounded before he could stop it. “Albus?” The blue blinked, somehow angry and perplexed for a moment before shimmering more to the shade of silver than what Newt had mistaken it for and Newt properly took in the contrasting eye not far off it. “Gellert?”

“Yes, that’s right, I’m here Newt.”

“Did I go somewhere?” he blinked again ”Did you?” Newt asked, huffing a laugh into the cool hands cupping his face and holding him up, realising as he did so that he was all but slumped in the older man’s arms and quickly moved to rectify the situation, momentarily forgetting that one arm was immobile and bound in a cloth sling. He gasped, gritting his teeth against the pain that flared through him at the attempted movement, blinking back the crimson spots that flared to life in his vision.

“Newt, please don’t try to move again, I don’t think that giving you any more anaesthetic this soon after your operation would be wise,” Gellert’s voice was clearer now and so was Newt’s sight when he opened his eyes, he was lying on his good side, near the edge of the bed and Gellert was bent over him. One hand was checking Newt’s pulse at his neck and the other was pressed to his clammy forehead. “Are you back with me?”

“Yes,” Newt replied hoarsely, blinking a bit to help his eyes readjust “I’m with you.”

“That’s good to hear,”

“I’m with you,” He repeated, a bit faintly, a bit fondly but found himself smiling hazily. Mentally shaking himself, Newt’s brows furrowed as the earlier events filtered back to him “You said I had a panic attack?”

“A mild one, yes,” Gellert agreed mildly and Newt frowned a little, still feeling his pulse thrumming fast and his head aching.

“I’ve never had a panic attack before. Not like that, at least.” He shifted a little so that he could better prop himself up on the pillow to look at Gellert’s calm face. “You don’t seem particularly concerned about that.”

“I said it was mild,” Gellert said with the barest hint of a smile pulling at the corner of his lip “Besides, what kind of psychiatrist would I be if I did not remain calm for the sake of my patient.”

Newt huffed a slightly incredulous laugh “I’m your patient, now am I?”

“As per your discharge papers from the hospital, yes, you are for the time being.”

Newt’s frown returned as he tried to sift through his memories for anything clear after Gellert had gone off to talk with Graves but found himself coming up blank up until the car ride. “I'm sorry, but what exactly happened after you arrived at the hospital? I don’t remember much...is that normal?”

“You’ve undergone a great deal in a short space of time, both physically and emotionally. It’s not uncommon for distressed or grieving individuals to experience panic attacks, distraction or other such conditions.”

Newt nodded a little numbly into the plush pillow. It was so soft, it really felt like he could sleep here the night through. Just so long as Gellert didn’t leave his side. He looked over to the older man who was shaking out a blanket, standing nearby, calm and collected as anything, he hadn’t just had to coax Newt back from – despite what the doctor had said - felt like quite a serious panic attack. Newt smiled as Gellert placed the blanket around him and it was clear the older man was about to leave the room so the zoologist spoke up, managing to lever himself up against the headboard so that he could better see the other man “Can-...can you stay and talk a while longer? Please?”

“Of course,” Gellert replied, coming back to sit beside Newt, their legs resting alongside one another, it remaining the only point of contact but oddly being enough. Feeling the peculiarly cool body temperature so near his own, the zoologist noticed for the first time that Gellert had changed, now wearing a fine-knit black jumper and smart-casual charcoal grey trousers. Newt smiled softly and draped the blanket over the older man too, ensconcing them both in its warmth and whilst Gellert looked a touch surprised by the gesture, he soon inched that bit closer, sitting shoulder to shoulder, one hand drifting to rest on Newt’s thigh. Not in a suggestive way, just resting there.

“Is there something in particular, you wanted to talk about or was it more the company you needed?”

“Yes, I think is the answer to that,” Newt replied, looking sideways at the doctor through his mussed fringe and they shared a slight huff of amusement. 

“And what answers are you seeking, Newt?”

“Ones that I’m not entirely sure you can or will give,”

“I will admit that there are things that I cannot or will not tell you. I have doctor-patient confidentiality to consider…amongst other things.”

Newt huffed another laugh, his fingers idly playing with the edge of the blanket “It’s-…it’s nothing like that, not really.” Gellert did not press and Newt sighed before answering the unasked question. “I’m wondering about you. Graves…he said some things that got me thinking more about things that had already been-” he waved his good hand in a noncommittal gesture “-needling at me and I felt that I should start getting the truth from you before he started filling my head with whatever, booze-fuelled mid-life crisis he’s got going on right now.” 

Gellert’s eyes narrowed and his tone was tense “Detective Graves has been causing you trouble?”

“Just a smidge,” Newt admitted “But he’s also helped me a great deal. I don’t think he means any harm, I just think he’s going through a…a rough patch in his life and he’s doing whatever he thinks he needs to do to stop it.”

“That’s a rather benevolent way of putting it,” Gellert replied mildly though with something else glimmering behind those odd, off, beautiful eyes.

“I don’t think benevolence comes into it, more a sort of grudging acceptance, I think, maybe mixed with a bit of pity.”

“Still, it seems that Graves has made quite an impression on you.”

“I’ve heard a fair bit about him before,” Newt admitted softly “He’s been involved with a friend of mine for a few years now, on and off. He comes into the city whenever the whim strikes him and then leaves Jared feeling that much worse for it every time he does. I would’ve thought it’d stop surprising him after a while but it never seems to quite get the message through.” He shook out a watery laugh and rubbed a hand over his face. “But that wasn’t really what I wanted to be talking about, I’m afraid.”

“No, I don’t imagine it was,” the elder replied evenly. “But you’re not being particularly forthcoming upon the matter.”

“Sorry, there’s just a part of me that’s becoming a touch paranoid as, in the time that I’ve known you – barely over a week, I might add – rather a lot of strange things have been happening and I realise, now more than ever, that I don’t know that much about you at all.”

“As you say, we have not known each other very long. Time is what is responsible for the most solid of friendships and the foundation of much more. You needn’t feel hurried into any of what may or may not come, Newt, neither of us is going anywhere that I am yet aware of.”

“You’re right, of course, but-” Newt shifted a little where he sat so that he was facing Gellert better, more able to take in the older man’s reactions as he confessed, “I’ve had a…rather bad experience with having my trust broken before in circumstances somewhat similar to these and I find myself quite desperately not wanting a repeat.”

“How similar exactly?”

Newt ducked his head and couldn’t think of an answer to that that wouldn’t insult Gellert. The elder nodded, seemingly to himself as if in acceptance of Newt’s hesitancy and instead asked: “Do you want to talk about what you found tonight?”

“I already did that with the detectives who interrogated me about it.”

“True, but it might help to speak those words to a sympathetic ear,”

“I don’t really want to burden you…”

“It is no burden, I assure you, as you know, I have already been called to consult upon murders that sound to be of a similar nature and as both a highly-skilled surgeon and attentive psychiatrist, I believe I may be uniquely qualified amongst those you know to offer a little insight and perhaps even some peace.”

“You know that sometimes you can be awfully sure of yourself?” Newt asked and Gellert cocked an eyebrow at him, seemingly amused by the comment.

“Is that such a bad thing?”

“I’ll get back to you on that,” Newt replied, a little absently. “But in answer to your question…I don’t really know how I feel about any of this. Horrified, obviously, I suppose. But I don’t feel particularly…frightened. I suppose that would’ve been a normal reaction after seeing something like that? Someone that could have been me had I been in the wrong time at the wrong place.”

“Because of how close it was to your home? Or perhaps because of the arguable similarities between yourself and the victims?”

“What do you mean by similarities, exactly?”

“You gave me the impression that this is yet another victim of the killer that has become infamous within the city, yes? I believed it was a fair assumption that the body you found was a young man, a student, perhaps, and someone who, as you said, could have been you.”

“It wasn’t that he could have been me that bothered me.”

“Then what was it?”

He could feel Gellert’s eyes piercing him as he answered, almost impulsively “It was the fact that I’d met him, he was the barista that served me when we were at Temple Coffee. He was a student too, I saw him a few times around the campus and he seemed…nice, he always smiled and I-…when I was accused of being the one to do that to him…it hurt in a way that I can’t quite describe.”

“And why do you think this might have affected you so?” Gellert asked, “A personal or even tenuous connection aside, what is it that might have stuck like a burr in your mind?”

It occurred to Newt then, what an odd psychiatric conversation this was to be having whilst sitting beside one another on a bed under a blanket but he thought it over all the same before answering. “I felt like it was my fault he was there. Not in the way that I killed him or even helped whoever did, but with him and the other students and Credence…it all felt…deliberate.”

“Credence?”

“A boy-…a young man I knew when I was in London. He was one of the earlier victims, only found recently after having been dead for years and its starting to explain an awful lot about-” He stopped himself abruptly, the reflex of wanting to not mention Albus or the train-wreck involved therein but then he looked over at Gellert and saw the look in his eyes, the utter…diligence and he took a deep breath before continuing in a low, throaty yet oddly soft voice. “The person I have quite deliberately _not_ been telling you about. He had a younger brother, well, step-brother, really and that was Credence, the one who was murdered whilst I was still in London. He was only seventeen years old.” His breathing was coming in fast and sharp, like razorblades in his throat but he couldn’t seem to stop talking “But I didn’t know about it and A-...he must have – must have kept it from me too - and it just seems too much and I don’t like the thought of-…well, the thought that morbid coincidences keep on happening around me. Past what I have done to help keep creatures safe, past what accidents or incidents have befallen people I knew or was close to-” he stopped to take a much-needed breath after his pent-up frustration came out in a torrent and it stuttered slowly to a petering stop when he finished “I’m rather tired of people being hurt around me and no matter what I do or where I go, it doesn’t seem to stop.”

“Newt, you’re slipping again, remember the pattern, in for four, hold for four, out for five,” Gellert told him, gripping his shoulders firmly and turning the zoologist so that his back was against the headboard, a cool, hard support on his back as the blanket fell down around him, pooling at his waist. He did as instructed and repeated the motion a few more times, feeling the air soothe him even as his brain continued to whir into almost overdrive, heating and struggling but never quite overwhelming as Gellert held him firm. 

“There you go, well done,” Gellert’s voice was almost pure honey though it had yet another edge to it that Newt couldn’t quite explain. “Please, do not feel the need to force things through you that could cause more harm than good.”

“I’m sorry but wasn’t that exactly what you were just asking me to?” He mumbled into Gellert’s shoulder and he felt the huff of dissatisfied breath against his neck as the zoologist got his response.

“I had not realised the extent to which this had affected you, I apologise.”

“Neither had I,” came the murmured reply and as the first tendrils of sleepiness began to slip into Newt’s consciousness, he forcibly shook himself aware and blinked over at Gellert who was watching him with half-lidded, curious eyes. “I should probably go, I have classes and I’ve got to get the money to-”

“Newt, calm yourself, I already told you that I was going to take care of everything. Do you trust me?” his mismatched eyes were warm and intense on Newt’s and he found himself nodding. “You are free to stay here for as long as you need and I can drive you to any classes you have during the rest of the week but for today, I believe it would be better for you to rest.”

Newt felt a slight flush creep up his neck at the thought of his classmates – most especially Jared – and teachers seeing him being driven around by someone like Gellert “I don’t have my clothes or any of my notes or books, it’d probably be best if I-”

“If we leave a little earlier, you can collect whatever you need from your flat before your lessons tomorrow.” Gellert was frowning a little, concern etching deeper lines around his eyes “I do not believe it is a good idea for you to be alone after what you have experienced, not to mention the evident threat of serial killers and loan sharks abound.”

Newt sighed but then let himself back down from where he had been slowly levering himself up, his back, shoulders and the solace of being cradled against Gellert’s chest all encouraging him to settle back down and for once take the easier route. “Thank you, Gellert- for this, for everything, I really can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

“It’s quite alright,” Gellert assured him with a smile, the man’s mismatched gaze staring at the opposite wall which boasted a golden gilt mirror and Newt looked over to it too. He was caught by the reflected image of himself curled against Gellert, his head full of copper curls a contrast to the older man’s pale collarbone that was left exposed by the loose-fitting jumper and Gellert’s arm loosely wrapped around his waist. The elder with a hand lying on the zoologist’s thigh in a possessive, reassuring gesture. It made quite an image and Newt found himself liking what he saw almost as much as the feeling of it all.

Gellert smiled and pressed a kiss to the side of Newt’s forehead and smoothed his hair back from his eyes in a tender gesture, Newt’s lips curling in a mirror of the man he was leant against. He settled in closer, more horizontally on the bed now as Gellert draped the blanket over both of them, settling into a more comfortable position for Newt’s abused, achy frame. A haziness dropped over Newt, not quite tiredness, not yet, but something closer to it than before he had cuddled up in the arms of this strange, _strange_ , lovely, slightly sinister man. 

“Newt?”

“Hmm?”

“This man that hurt you so, I will not ask for his name as you seem so reluctant to give it, but I will ask what he did that had such an effect on you.”

“Why?” Newt murmured into his chest, pressing his eyes tight shut at the sting and sleepiness in them.

Gellert hesitated for a while longer before he replied, “So that I can make sure I never make that same mistake.”

Newt forced a laugh “Well, I doubt that will be a problem unless you abandon me tied to a chair for hours with no explanation and then not think to mention the reason you did it was because your younger brother was brutally murdered.”

“Well, the latter part proves supremely unlikely as I have no siblings to speak of but I shall promise not to leave you tied to any chairs...” Gellert assured him before his lips creased in a salacious smile “-with no explanation.”

Newt smiled into Gellert’s shoulder, huffing a laugh too “I’m serious!”

“As am I.”

Newt was silent a while longer and Gellert must evidently have thought he had fallen asleep as he gently began to extricate himself from under and around the zoologist. Newt let it happen but just as he heard the quiet click of Gellert’s hand on the doorknob, he asked without even opening his eyes “Why did you offer me that job?”

There was a pause before his answer came, just as sleep was clawing at the edges of his mind and if was soft and sincere “Because there is nothing that I hate more in this world than wasted potential.”

Newt did not consider any of that as seconds after it was said, he was already drifting off into an uneasy sleep.

Uneasy was a mild word for what followed.

Newt became slowly aware of how the covers had somehow become tangled around him in his slumber. It wasn’t all that unusual, he rolled and kicked out softly, no real effort to it as he attempted to right himself to fall properly back to sleep. His legs were caught again quickly, however, the panic of his immobility a slowly rising thing, just as slow and steady as the bindings that were winding and wrapping their ways up his legs and rising to bind his torso too. Newt’s eyes remained glued shut, he couldn’t seem to open them and moaned, low and throaty in distress as the material, whatever it was, lashed out quicker and tighter, spinning around him in binding circles, regardless of the mattress underneath, in fact, seeming to come from the surface itself and he began to thrash in earnest as each part of him was dragged into the tight snare. It felt like he was sinking into a pit of binding limbs, long thin ropes of something oddly soft and powerful taking hold of him and drawing him deeper. It was hot, smothering, suffocating and as it reached his arms, his neck, his throat, he began to hyperventilate. He couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t even open his eyes to see what was surrounding him.

He felt a flush of adrenalin run through him and now his fighting grew desperate, he could hear things moving around on just the other side of the binding encompassing him, skittering and scuttling around, light, delicate footsteps twanging each of what he now realised were hundreds upon thousands of silken strands binding together to snare him. He screamed just as the layers rose up over his face, wrapping his jaw, wiring it shut, blocking his nose and mouth, creeping in, ever insidious and unstoppable even as he thrashed still. It was only once he was bound, head to toe, inescapably and suffocatingly, that the heat dissipated and he was suddenly submerged, blindly and inexplicably into freezing cold water. He drifted there, helpless and floating, not quite sinking, just carried along with currents that seemed out of place but also had no particular place or pace to be.

Newt felt safer now. In the familiar. Away from the smothering heat and drifting in the numbing cold of what he knew to be his lake. The frozen depths that he had sunk into most every night in recent weeks. They might have been terrifying before, to slip and crack and fall into, desperate fingers gripping onto cracked, icy edges, but now, after that…he was content to just float here.

Witless and weightless in his inescapable cocoon. 

Which was why it proved a nasty shock when something gripped onto him by the ankle and dragged him kicking and screaming back to the surface.

Literally.

Only the thing dragging him back wasn’t doing so by his ankles but more by tight grips on his shoulders, human hands shaking him and attempting to pacify him as he fought with everything he had to be free.

“Newt? Newt? Calm the fuck down, pal, it's only me!”

Newt’s eyes flew open at the familiar, though entirely unexpected voice, blinking and blinking until Jared’s tanned, flushed face came into view and Newt registered for the first time that he was standing. He was standing in his own flat. It was tidier than before and everyone was present and accounted for – minus Monty, of course – but all seemed contended and when Newt looked at his own hand, he saw a half-empty packet of seed clenched tightly in it, the contents spilling over his hand and onto the floor as he released the death grip that he had on it. He looked at Jared, utterly bewildered and feeling the first stirrings of fear as he realised that he was still in his friend’s grip and that from the bruises and the light scratch on the American’s hands and face, it had been him that Newt had been fighting.

He gasped, jumping back and tearing himself from the hold, Jared letting him go and holding his hands up in a passive, surrendering gesture. “Sorry if I scared you, buddy.” 

“What am I doing here?” Newt gasped and Jared’s brows knotted in confusion and concern.

“You were taking care of the Chaffinch, Lisbet, right?”

“I was?”

“Yeah, I knocked and the door was open, I came in and you were feeding her but when I came up behind you, you freaked and started screaming at me.” Jared looked seriously worried “You were acting like I was tryin ta kill ya. I tried talking some sense into you but you kept on hitting me, I had to grab you to stop you from hurting yourself. And me.” He rubbed lightly at a slowly blooming red mark around his jawline and Newt winced in shame and sympathy.

“I’m so sorry…” Newt whispered, looking down at himself and seeing that he was standing there half-naked, only wearing his trousers and socks, his body was bruised still, scratched and he’d lost the sling holding his arm somewhere along the way. His injuries were pounding with what felt like a pulse of their own, aching and throbbing, protesting their mistreatment vehemently.

“It’s okay, just breathe, yeah?”

“Trying to…” Newt responded, just trying to stop his head from spinning. “So, I was caring for my creatures…completely normally? Nothing strange? I didn’t hurt any of them? Please tell me I didn’t hurt any of them.”

“No, you only went all savage when I tried to touch you.” He chuckled a little forcedly “Guess that was my mistake, huh?”

“I must’ve been…sleepwalking, I suppose.”

“You seemed pretty awake to me, buddy.”

“But I don’t remember _any of it_!”

“I don’t know what to tell you, Newt.”

“I don’t know what to think.”

“What’s the last thing you remember?”

Newt sank onto the sofa, massaging his stiff, pain-wracked arm with gritted teeth and low hisses of pain “I was at Gellert’s…I fell asleep in his guest bedroom.”

“So when the hell did-” he gestured towards Newt’s battered face and body in a sweeping gesture “-that happen?”

Newt winced, both inwardly and outwardly “Long story but not really the thing to be focusing on here, I think.”

“Fucking hell, man, I only came here to drop off the classwork and you tell me that being beaten up is the least of ya troubles? What the hell happened?”

“Classwork?” 

Jared nodded and gestured to his own bright orange backpack where it was resting on the floor nearby with a half-crumpled sheaf of papers sticking haphazardly out of the top. “Yeah, the stuff from today, figured that after what happened last night, you’d taken the day off so Argent told me to give you the work.”

Newt glanced up at the clock on the fall, seeing that it was half-past three. He’d lost more time. He groaned, feeling decidedly ill and pressed his head into his hands. What was happening to him? “Thanks,” Newt managed to murmur before asking, almost not wanting to know the answer “It’s still Monday, right?”

Jared nodded slowly.

It was then that there was a polite knock at the door and Newt went to answer it only to be pushed back down with a firm hand on his shoulder. He let it happen simply because he realised that he didn’t have the strength to do otherwise. Jared opened the door, by doing so blocking Newt’s view of who was there but as soon as he heard a familiar voice sound out, he knew who it was and leant over to tug on Jared’s sleeve. “It’s alright, Jared, let him in.”

The American looked over at him a little dubiously but stepped aside anyway. Gellert stepped into his flat with customary grace and confidence despite carrying two hefty shopping bags in one hand. Newt eyed both him and the bags curiously as Gellert set them down on the kitchen table, turning back to the zoologist with a mild expression. “I got everything you mentioned needing and a few extra bits that I plan to make dinner with.”

Newt blinked “Sorry, what?”

Gellert arched one pale eyebrow “What is it that you’re confused about exactly?”

“I-...when did I get here? The last thing I remember was going to sleep...was it this morning?”

Gellert’s brows knitted in almost as much consternation as Jared’s still were. “You have no memory of today at all?”

“None, up until a few minutes ago, that is,” Newt told him and Gellert was quick to step forward, feeling Newt’s forehead once more, checking his pupil reaction and moving a finger slowly around in front of him to test his sight. Newt let it happen, going along with the procedures numbly, feeling like there was something large and hollow building inside his stomach.

“Not to interrupt and all, but who the heck are you?” Newt had never seen Gellert so close to glaring at someone as he did at that moment but by the time he turned to face Jared, his polite, unshakable demeanour was back in place with a seamlessness that might have astounded Newt had he not had a great deal more on his mind right then.

“Apologies for not making a proper introduction sooner but as you can see, there are somewhat more pressing matters at hand.”

Jared’s eyes narrowed at the cool, dismissive address and Newt piped up before the Texan could insult Gellert further. “Jared, this is Gellert Grindelwald. Gellert, this is Jared Harkaway.”

Whilst his friend still looked a bit miffed, Jared stepped forward and offered his hand, green eyes fixed intently upon Gellert’s face. The doctor took the proffered hand and they shook despite Jared gripping the older man's wrist a bit more tightly than a traditional handshake would have done. It was almost as if Jared were trying to goad or get a better gauge of the man before him. It niggled at Newt a little but he decided to let it go for the time being, more concerned with the fact that he appeared to be sleepwalking or losing large chunks of time and memory with increasing and alarming regularity. Maybe he'd hit his head a few too many times when Grimmson and his thugs had set in on him. Though he thought he might’ve noticed a head injury bad enough to leave him with a concussion like that. Or that at least the doctors or Gellert might have. It was all so terribly confusing.

“Now, Newt. Can you tell me when you noticed you were losing time? Was it before or after your surgery?” Gellert was facing him again, the darker eye crinkled around the edges with concern though he did briefly glance between the two younger men, as if asking permission for something.

Newt twigged on fairly quickly that Gellert was nonverbally asking whether he was okay discussing this in front of Jared and he inclined his head slightly in response before he spoke. “Well, I lost most of the weekend but I think that was more because I was asleep than anything else.”

“Are you sure about that?” Gellert asked, his tone careful and Newt frowned. 

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that you spent today behaving perfectly normally, speaking, responding and moving about as if you were awake and yet you remember none of it. There is a chance that this could account for the days you recently missed.” He looked about the flat, taking in everything and everyone in it before saying “Your animals did not seem any worse for you having been indisposed for as long as you think you were. Perhaps this is because you were caring for them as you usually would have but simply do not remember doing so. I imagine habitual behaviours such as that may have been ingrained into you so much so that it becomes instinctual. And likely why you asked to come here when I believed you had awoken earlier today.”

Newt nodded numbly, everything that the psychiatrist was saying made sense but it made it no less terrifying – the idea that he could have been up and doing or saying anything over the past few days and have no recollection or inkling of it whatsoever…

“Newt…” Jared’s voice broke the zoologist out of his half-stupor and he looked up to where his friend was standing off to one side, having half-forgotten that the man was there too. “I think you need to go back to the hospital. Get checked up on. This crap ain’t normal.”

“I checked up on the blood tests and x-rays they did whilst you were in hospital. I do not remember seeing anything that would cause sleep issues or memory loss like this. I believe that the cause of this is perhaps more linked to what you’ve experienced emotionally rather than physically.”

“I-…you checked my records?” Newt frowned, suspecting that wasn’t something that was often allowed and Gellert nodded.

“You were signed out into my care both in a medical and psychiatric sense after I provided my credentials and though I now understand that your consent in this matter was perhaps unreliable, at the time, you seemed quite agreeable.” Gellert’s brows creased further and he dipped his head in apology, sitting down on the sofa beside Newt with an exhale “I’m sorry that I did not see the truth of the matter and ask that you forgive my negligence. I was merely concerned of what else might befall you should you be left unsupervised after all that has occurred.”

Newt shook his head wearily “It’s quite alright…if I was acting normally, then I doubt there was any way you could have known and it’s not exactly something most people think to check for,” He huffed a soft laugh and his voice dropped to just above a whisper “Whether someone is walking around but not truly aware of it.”

“You would perhaps be surprised how often it comes up,” Gellert told him with the slightest of wry smiles as his hand came over to gently clasp Newt’s good one and it was only as he felt a steady hand that Newt realised how much his were trembling. The tremors subsided under the warmth and comfort of the touch until he finally got the wherewithal to twine his fingers through with Gellert’s, giving them a gentle, grateful squeeze.

Jared was watching them, Newt could feel his gaze but when he looked up, he saw that his friend’s expression had softened somewhat, seeming to see something before him that dispersed his earlier dislike for Gellert. At least a little. Jared smiled tightly at him and looked towards the door before grabbing his backpack, taking out the classwork and dropping it next to the shopping bags on the kitchen table before looking back to the men huddled on the sofa together.

Gellert seemed to notice too and his expression became contrite as he regarded the young American “I did not mean to be quite so short with you before, Mr Harkaway. I can see that you are merely concerned for your friend and I must say I respect that. He is indeed fortunate to have friends he can rely upon.”

Newt felt something warm creep into his chest at the sincerity he heard in Gellert’s voice; the attempt to reconcile the earlier waspishness between them and whilst Jared seemed taken aback by it, he offered a short nod. “Well, thanks. Sorry to be on ya back quite so quickly. Didn’t mean nothing by it apart for lookin’ out for Newt here.” The Texan shot Newt a wink before he glanced towards the door again. “I should get going. I’ll swing by at some point during the week, alright?”

“Of course,” Newt responded reflexively and smiled until the door shut behind his friend and instead let the expression drop, burying his face in one hand and letting out a long breath. Without looking up or moving at all, he asked “What exactly happened today? Can you walk me through everything? To see if it jogs my memory a bit?”

“You slept from not long after we arrived at my house until perhaps eleven o’clock. I made you some French Toast and he talked a little before you asked if we could return here so that you might check in on your creatures. You then mentioned needing to run some errands but in your current state, I offered to fetch them for you. When I left, you were caring for Pickett.”

Newt nodded, it seemed that for all the potential danger of these blackouts or whatever they were, he hadn’t gotten into much trouble. Aside from the looming fact that he had a bloodthirsty loan shark to pay in less than six hours. The thought had his head jerking up and he looked to Gellert with panic rising in him “Oh god, what, Grimmson and-…I need to get that money soon or-”

Gellert raised a placating hand and pulled out a large wad of money from his long-coat pocket “When I said that I took care of the errands you needed to run, I meant it.” He offered the money to Newt who stared at it in utter bafflement, not taking it but not quite knowing what to say either. He stared a while longer until he decided to state the obvious.

“There’s more than what I owe Grimmson there.”

“Yes, there is.” Gellert agreed, still holding out the cash.

“How-…why?”

“You needed the money in the first place to live on, yes? This should pay off your debt and tide you over.”

“Gellert, I can’t possibly take this, I-”

“You can and you most certainly should. Think of it as an investment.”

Newt huffed a watery laugh, voice strained again “In what?”

“In you.”

“Look, I’m not entirely sure what you believe I’m capable of but I don’t think that I’m going to be able to repay you for this.”

“Not unless you had a stable job with a higher income than the one you currently have.”

Newt’s eyes narrowed a fraction “Are you offering me this money so that I’ll take the job that you _also_ offered to me?”

“If that’s what it takes, yes.”

“But why?”

“I told you, I hate nothing more than wasted potential and you are a brilliant, albeit unfortunate, young man who has the potential to make the very difference that you seek. It would be remiss of me to let that potential go wasted. Or to let you suffer, knowing that there was something I could have done about it.” He let out a humoured breath “Most especially when giving that help would not even make a dent in my current living or financial situation. This money does not have the same value to me as it does to you. Take it and repay whatever debt you feel you owe by taking the role that I’m offering you. Help people. I suspect you’ll be rather good at it judging by the instinctive way you care for these creatures.” His smile was fond and Newt found himself taking the neat stack of notes from Gellert with the tiniest of nods, leaning forward as he did so and capturing Gellert’s lips in a soft, chaste kiss. 

It deepened of its own accord but no heat entered it more than a careful, comforting warmth. It was an easy thing to slip into and Newt’s good hand came up to tangle in the loose strands of Gellert’s white-blonde hair. Gellert was careful with him, paying attention to his injuries as he held him and working seamlessly without aggravating any of them. They moved together, drifting against the back of the sofa as Gellert directed them both, one hand bracing Newt’s neck whilst the other drifted down his side, almost ticklish as he found the dip of Newt’s hip and the zoologist huffed a little amusement into the kiss, smiling despite himself. 

It wasn’t until the pressure of Gellert bearing down on him and the effort of holding his own arm immobile became too much that he let out a soft noise of pained protest and glanced over Gellert’s shoulder around at the room. “Where did the bandages go? My shirt too for that matter?”

Gellert drew back from him with a slight sigh “Now that I’m afraid I can’t answer. You had them on when I left though you also didn’t seem particularly happy about it. You couldn’t seem to shake a reflexive need to be rid of them, kept on tugging at the sling until I reminded you not you.”

Newt nodded, thinking to the dreams he’d been having and supposing that the terror of being cocooned in some unknown substance had translated either to or from him trying to get the bandages off. His sleeping, confused mind must have thought that the two things were one and the same and tried to rid himself of them in any way he could. Tried to claw himself free of something he couldn’t really escape.

Newt leant up and looked around, seeing what appeared to be the tattered remnants of the cloth bandages littering the floor beneath his bed, and sticking out of the loose floorboard in the kitchen where Liza hid herself…and in the cage that he’d been tending to when Jared arrived. A bit of it was stuck on Lisbet’s talons. He huffed a breath of amusement as he realised that he must’ve set about putting the wrappings to another purpose, offering them to his animal roommates, perhaps as a form of comfort or apology for what had been done to Monty on his watch. It made no sense but at the same time, seeing that Liza was cuddled up in her share of the shredded bandages and that Lisbet was scrit-scratting about with her own…he couldn’t help but feel like it had made a difference.

Even a small one. 


	13. The door below it splinters and the creature creeps inside

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you listen to the songs referenced 'There there' by Radiohead and then 'Supermassive Blackhole' by Muse, you'll get a better feel of everything

_30 th\- 31st October _

It had been a slow week in a number of ways, each day he spent with Gellert never too far away; the slowness seemed to stem from the way that as Gellert was often around, they drew closer surprisingly quickly and as the doctor had taken to exercising care over both Newt’s physical and mental maladies, the ties seemed to tighten that much quicker. They slipped into a routine of Newt going to classes as usual, studying in between and caring for his creatures with little change from his usual routine; but afterwards and in between, Gellert was almost always there to check in on him. He dressed his wounds, checked his bandages and asked him regular questions, digging into whether there had been any further losses of time. Thankfully, Newt could honestly say that he didn’t think there were any. Obviously, it wasn’t something he could be entirely certain of, as, when asleep, he could not account for his own behaviour, but considering he didn’t wake anywhere other than his bed, sofa or – on one painful occasion, the floor – he felt that it was safe to assume that the lost time was not a reoccurring issue. Thank god for small mercies. And those mercies seemed to be coming with increasing frequency, he found like when Gellert had been kind enough to go to Grimmson’s awful office on the other side of the city and pay the money that Newt owed.

Newt had nearly driven himself into another panic attack when he had considered seeing the man again, going and facing down Grimmson and giving the murdering, soulless bastard money after all that he had done. He’d fretted over what the loan shark would do, whether he’d demand more, whether he’d come back and hurt more innocent creatures or people just to drive home his point…Gellert had managed to calm him and then, whilst Newt was caught in a restless slumber aided by strong pain medication, had done the deed on his behalf, returning no worse for it. Whilst Newt had verbally berated the elder man to the point of borderline abuse, he had secretly just been relieved. Relieved that Gellert was safe and that Newt didn’t have to go near Grimmson ever again.

Not that it was the last he heard of him, of course, but that part - Newt took private pride in it – was on his own terms. Now Newt had never considered himself a vindictive or vengeful person, but on this occasion, he saw nothing wrong with using the network of activist friends and researchers he had made over the years to expose some of Grimmson’s wrongdoings. Not the ones that connected him to Newt, of course -- the last thing he needed was to be questioned by the police so soon after being interrogated concerning a brutal string of murders. No, it was a subtler thing than that.

First, his friend in Belarus with the screen-name SwoopinEvile brought to light instances of tax evasion on Grimmson’s part over the past few decades.

Then, Frank-en-furter from Arizona dug up the money-laundering charges that had been mysteriously dropped by a bribed judge back in 2006 and again in 2013.

TheFan4asticNagini from Indonesia found over sixteen separate cases of assault with a deadly weapon linked to the men in Grimmson’s employ.

And the final nail in the coffin was when Fawkes-of-Fire469 found several arson incidents that matched the man’s MO.

It had taken less than a week for the charges to all catch up with the man and his cronies in an unfortunate and foul – for them, certainly – swoop. The evidence had trickled in anonymously and through a few engaged witnesses. It was all arranged after just one 16-hour session of Newt hunched, pained and buzzing on painkillers over his laptop, arranging it all to culminate in Grimmson and those in his employ being put behind bars for a minimum of ten years each. It had been some time since Newt had reached out to any of his online connections but when they heard of what Grimmson had done, they were more than happy to help and had worked quickly to help Newt get some justice for his dead friend. He didn’t mention any of it to his local friends or Gellert, for that matter, though there had been a moment – the first time that Newt saw the doctor after he heard of Grimmson’s arrest – that he caught Gellert looking at him with a particularly intense and seemingly random note of fondness. Almost like he knew, and that he was proud. Neither spoke of it. But there was a part of Newt that held onto that moment, treasured it and found a warm spark kindling within him whenever he thought of it. Realistically, he knew that Gellert _couldn’t_ know it was him that brought Grimmson to justice, even if he had heard about it, but that warm spark remained despite that knowledge. The feeling of it was enough.

Aside from that, days had passed normally until today. When Jared had decided as the next night was Halloween, that they should go out and, in his words, get ‘ _supreeeeemely wasted’._ Newt was understandably dubious.

“Come on, buddy! You’re already half-wrapped up like a mummy, why not take advantage of it and use it as a cheapo costume?”

Newt laughed despite himself as he stood beside Jared during one of their more practical demonstrations of the skills learnt on their course. They were both meant to be completing the 120-page booklet of environmental and care factors as they walked around the Dublin Zoo but as Newt couldn’t write particularly well with one arm still bound in a cloth sling, Jared had been partnered with him to do most of the note-taking work. They were working together pretty well considering, as Jared was a quick writer and Newt already knew everything relevant to each creature and habitat they passed.

“Check boxes eleven, seven and fourteen,” Newt commented as they stood beside the jaguar enclosure before sighing and adding, “I’m still in a fair bit of pain, Jared and I-”

He cut himself off at Jared’s snort of derision and gave his friend a _look._

Jared seemed only too happy to elaborate as he jabbed his chewed upon pen into a suddenly sore spot just above Newt’s collarbone. “You sure about that buddy?”

“I don’t really see how you poking my injuries exactly proves or helps anything,” Newt muttered, a bit disgruntled as he tugged his shirt collar back into place from where it had slipped down and Jared rolled his eyes exasperatedly.

“Not what I was looking at. I was talking bout the frickin’ hickey marks ya got all over you.”

Newt flushed a brilliant crimson but said nothing as he powered on towards the lioness’ enclosure instead, head buried in his one-hand-held book of notes despite not needing them at all by this point. Jared followed swiftly after him and wrapped an arm around his uninjured shoulder with a sly grin on his tanned face until Pickett popped his little green-brown speckled face out of that side pocket and hissed at the American reproachfully, causing him to step back a little so that he was no longer crushing the reptile. “Ain’t nothing to be ashamed of, just a sign that you’re probably feeling better, feeling better enough to go out with your old pal Jared, huh?”

Newt closed his eyes momentarily before nodding slowly and Jared stopped just short of clapping him on the back before he skipped back, phone in hand as his fingers blurred across the screen in rapid motion. “Great! Now I’ve just texted Queenie so you can’t back out now…or ever.” He shrugged, hand over heart in mock-sadness, “But hey, it’s been great knowing ya, kiddo.”

“Likewise,” Newt half-groaned but with a genuine grin stretching his lips. Perhaps this would be one of the times he didn’t end up regretting going out. He had a great deal of energy pent-up these days and it just so happened that the cause of that pent-up was also the source of the hickeys lining his neck. Gellert and he had spent a great deal of time together and had grown more intimate because of it. Gellert had taken to teasing Newt to the point of almost maddening frustration and then easing off, claiming Newt’s injuries as his excuse but each and every time, Newt had seen a playful, almost sadistically so, glimmer in his eyes and the curve of his lips that told the zoologist Gellert knew _exactly_ what he was doing. It was infuriating! But also irresistibly hot. Even the memory of what had occurred the night before was enough for Newt’s flush to reach past his collar and his head to duck even further into his scrawled notes. In his opinion, the sling on his arm couldn’t come off soon enough and thankfully it would do so the next day by the doctor’s advice as long as Newt was careful.

As it was, going out on Halloween like a normal twenty-something-year-old seemed like a good enough distraction as any. 

They trekked their way around, mostly encumbered by Newt lingering longer than Jared wanted to on certain animals, taking in sad eyes or improperly maintained habitats and scrawling down notes that he passed off to one of the keepers he knew, Charlie, and thanked the man as he promised to have the situations corrected as soon as possible. It was something he’d started doing years ago when he first came to the city but had become accepted by most of the zoo staff and Newt’s own lecturers.

It was closing time by the time that the pair left, Newt promising to send Jared on his more thorough notes later that night as they went to part ways in the car-park. Newt stopped, however, as he spotted familiar black Harley parked not far away and an equally familiar suited figure leant against it in a way reminiscent of how he himself had once done so. He sighed to himself but went over, following after Jared and cocking an eyebrow as Graves removed his helmet and tipped a half-nod to Newt and a grin to Jared.

“How’s the recovery going?”

Newt stared at the fenders of the man’s bike in a habitual manner. “Not too bad, ta.” 

“Jared mentioned you’ll be coming along tomorrow night so I suppose that must be true.”

Newt craned his head up to narrow his eyes at his friend, “Did he now? That’s odd, considering I only just agreed to it.”

“What can I say? I had faith in you.”

“I’m sure,” he replied dryly before doing a slight double-take and looking back to Graves. “Hang on a tic, you’re going to be there?”

Graves arched a sardonic dark brow at him, “Is there a reason I shouldn’t be?”

“No, no reason,” Newt replied, a bit too quickly and it was Jared’s turn to narrow his eyes at him, the zoologist sighed and relented. “I suppose I just didn’t expect you two to be back together…quite so soon.” He tacked the last part on at the increasing levels of amusement and incredulity he could see on both Americans’ faces and felt his flush reach his ears as he realised that they were both doing this quite deliberately.

“We’re not,” Jared clarified and Newt just found himself all the more confused. “He’s sticking round longer than originally planned and we figured it couldn’t hurt to keep in contact even if hooking up ain’t the best idea. The world is woefully short of good drinking buddies and Percy here happens to be one of the best I’ve ever had.” The words didn’t sound as bitter as they could’ve but Newt still got the feeling that this arrangement had been more Graves’ idea than Jared’s and he subsequently fixed the detective with a hard look because of it.

“What have I done now?”

“A word?” Newt asked tersely, jerking his head to a spot a little ways across the mostly empty car-park and Graves sighed, nudging the kickstand on his bike in a cursory manner before following Newt off to one side, just out of Jared’s line of sight. It was only once the zoologist felt sure they wouldn’t be interrupted that he elbowed Graves admonishingly on the arm with his good hand, the man winced, rubbing a hand theatrically over the spot he’d hit and suddenly Newt felt as if he were channelling his inner-Queenie. “I thought you were going to do the right thing here?”

“And what would that be, exactly?” Graves asked in his characteristically low voice, though with an edge that suggested he were humouring the younger man. “You don’t seem to be particularly clear on that matter yourself, so it leaves me at somewhat of a loss as to what is.”

Newt watched the other man for a long moment, eyes searching dark-whiskey tinted ones until he felt something loosen in his chest and he ducked his head briefly, fingers coming up to play idly with the edge of his sling before he spoke, softly and sincerely, “I’m sorry.”

Graves’ eyes widened and his brows knitted. “For what?”

“For being quite so waspish with you about this,” Newt admitted. “Honestly, you’ve been nothing but helpful as of late and I rather don’t think that you deserve to be interrogated for trying to do the right thing.” His head tilted of its own accord as he regarded Graves with a half-smile, “You’re a strange man, Graves, and honestly, a bit of an ass, but I like you and I’m still terribly grateful for what you did.”

Graves’ smile was soft and small but seemed to hold an almost weary quality to it that Newt couldn’t quite place as he said: “I’m glad to hear it.”

Newt nodded, almost to himself and turned to look back towards where Jared was messing about on his phone by Graves’ bike, though Newt could see the way his green eyes kept flickering their way every few moments. Newt realised how it must have seemed – him pulling Graves off the way he had – and aimed to return quickly so as to abate Jared’s unfounded paranoia. Graves’ voice caught him, however. “Is everything…alright with you?”

Newt blinked, glancing down at his sling-bound arm in confusion, “Well, no better since the last time you asked, I’m afraid.”

“I didn’t mean your injuries, I meant that after everything that has occurred...it would make sense for you to be-” he stopped at the look of growing defiance on Newt’s face and took a breath before he sighed again, “Grindelwald…he’s been treating you alright? He hasn’t hurt you at all?”

Newt’s eyes narrowed, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Graves nearly visibly winced and when he next spoke it sounded as if he were trying desperately to both ask something and not at the same time. Like he was scared of being overheard or misinterpreted. Despite there being no one else there but Newt. His eyes were fixed around the area of Newt’s shoulder in an odd reversal of how Newt usually found himself interacting with other people. “I’m merely…concerned about how things seem to be progressing so quickly between you despite your...condition.”

Newt laughed, a little hoarsely and glanced down, realising that the hickey Jared had spotted earlier was once again visible but this time, he raised his chin a little defiantly, eyes meeting Graves’ levelly, “I’m not really sure if what goes on between Gellert and myself is any of your business. I feel like I’m reminding you of this most every time we meet and it's honestly getting a little wearing.”

Graves looked understandably frustrated. “I’m trying to help you, Newt, but you’re not making it easy. Surely my being this intent on you being cautious of him should be enough to give you pause? I know him and I don’t think that being around him is a good idea for anyone, least of all you.” 

“Not when you refuse to give any sort of suitable explanation as to why that is,” Newt told him firmly. “If you don’t get along with Gellert, then that’s your business, I suppose, but unless you can give me a viable reason why _I_ shouldn’t be involved with him, I’m just going to continue living my life as I see fit, thank you very much.”

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Graves felt himself snap then and though he knew he may well regret the words that came out of his mouth, he said them anyway. His eyes were intent on Newt’s and though he felt the urge to grab Newt and shake him, he refrained from doing so as his dark eyes traced Newt’s visible injuries with something odd and strained- feeling, “Damn it, Newt. If I could tell you, I would but please believe me when I say that you are at more risk than you know. People who become aware of what he’s like and what he does don’t tend to live long and happy lives. If I tell you, he _will_ know and even if you try to hide that you know or even _suspect_ , he _will_ do something about it.”

Newt was watching him now, something implacable in his blue-green eyes that seemed kind, borderline pitying as he spoke, “Graves…if you really believed that- that he was someone who was going to hurt people- hurt me, even – then why would you not simply arrest him? You’re a detective. Granted, you may be a little out of your jurisdiction here, I’m sure, but that doesn’t mean that if you really thought something like this that you wouldn’t do anything about it.” Newt’s eyes shone with a surprising amount of surety then, bordering on trust and pity but something solid, nonetheless. “You seem like a decent fellow and I can’t imagine you’d be this ambiguous if there were any real danger in the way you seem to be implying.”

Graves pressed his eyes shut in the barely repressed urge to simply kidnap the young man and take him somewhere safe. Somewhere away from Grindelwald. He didn’t, of course; that was quite possibly the worst plan that anyone could’ve ever thought of but it didn’t stop the stupid, desperate instinct he felt in him to do _something_ this time around. To protect this stubborn young idiot from both himself and the cannibalistic, manipulative murderer he was dating. It felt too close, too similar to the many times before when he’d suspected a target and tried to help them only to be rebuffed by these people’s blind faith in their perception of the wonderful, empathetic Gellert Grindelwald. It had always ended the same way and it was killing him that even as he gave as close to a genuine warning as he dared, he was still failing. To protect Newt or to help anyone at all really. Instead, he decided to change tactics, to do something, that whilst riskier and potentially more emotionally devastating, might just end up saving Newt in the long run. It was a long shot but at this point, this far down in the spiral his life had taken, he couldn’t see why he shouldn’t at least _try._

He forced a sympathetic, almost apologetic smile onto his face, let it touch his eyes even as his heart clenched and fell in his chest, dropping to somewhere about his abused liver. “I didn’t mean it in that way, Newt. I’m just talking about the fact that I have a bit of experience in dating over a significant age gap and, as you can see-” he nodded over to Jared “-it rarely ends well for any involved. I get the feeling you don’t need to get hurt and maybe right now isn’t the best time for you to be trying something significant with someone like Grindelwald. He’s…he’s a bit intense. High maintenance, you could say, and I don’t think you’re really suited to it. Not entirely sure if anyone is, in all honesty.”

Newt seemed to relax as he spoke, as if he’d bought the withdrawal and side-smiled, “Well, not intending to be rude here – truly, I’m not – but I rather think that there’s quite a different dynamic between Gellert and I than you had with Jared.” Newt ducked his head again and the smile turned fond, if wistful, “And trust me, I’ve had a fair bit of experience with ‘intensity’ before. I’m aware it’s a double-edged sword in a great many ways but it’s been a long time since I’ve felt the inclination to give such a thing a shot.” His smile faded a little further even as it softened into something truly genuine, his eyes meeting Graves in a rare moment. “It feels good to want to _try_ again and I think that Gellert is a significant part of that.”

Graves inwardly sighed as his attempt was batted away but decided that the best tactic might require a steadier, subtler approach rather than the direct kind. “Right, right…just thought I’d put it out there.” He offered a thin, somewhat knowing smile as he shifted the subject to something that he’d been meaning to ask about for a few days now, “Did you hear that your loan shark Grimmson got jail-time? Thirty-three years in total, or so I hear, for various offences.”

“I think I heard something along those lines, yes,” Newt blinked yet maintained a level gaze with Graves which instantly set alarm bells ringing in the detective’s head, telling him his suspicions were correct but feeling the need to dig a little further all the same.

“A lot of things seemed to catch up to him very suddenly.”

“Must be kismet,” Newt replied offhandedly and Graves nearly rolled his eyes.

“Have to say it couldn’t happen to a more deserving person,” Graves said carefully. “Especially seeing as one of those arson incidents he was tied to was a ten-year-old unresolved case that I had been forced to drop due to lack of sufficient evidence and him fleeing the US. If I ever met the guy who sorted that for me, I’d owe them a drink for sure.”

The smallest quirk of a smile twitched Newt’s lips even as he jerked his head back towards Jared, starting to walk over but speaking even as he did so, “I’m sure that they’d tell you it wasn’t any trouble and that you’d probably be about even somehow.” He shrugged one-shouldered and casual, “Just a feeling.”

This time, Graves couldn’t control his snort of amusement as he followed the zoologist back over to his Harley and the young Texan standing beside her.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The night of Halloween dawned with no small amount of excitement on Newt’s part, surprisingly so, and though he didn’t go with Jared’s idea of an easy costume, he and Queenie did come up with something he quite liked. Granted, the costume was slightly skewed by the fact that his arm was still bandaged, though thankfully the sling had been taken off earlier that same day, he managed to accent and cover the injury by building the costume on top of it. It was an outfit inspired by some god-awful film he’d been dragged to see a few years before by a date who was still going through a rather severe emo phase. He hadn’t much minded at the time as the boy he went with had seemed quite keen on how similar Newt looked to the film’s antagonist.

Whilst he couldn’t quite recall what the sci-fi flick had been about, he recalled the gothic chic and admitted sexiness of the villain’s ensemble. It comprised of tight black-gold trousers, a long black sleeveless robe that boasted a high-necked collar and light golden and silver sparkles over the entirety of it, slicked-back hair and more guyliner than he’d ever thought he’d allow Queenie to put on him in his life…let alone in one sitting. He sat in her and Jacob’s lilac-painted double bedroom with her as she applied various…things to his face via brushes and sponges and a load of other implements Newt tried not to think about. She’d already wrapped his arms from wrist to elbow in dyed-black bandages that whist not particularly medically practical, worked well into the look. His back was bandaged with the same but the wrappings were mostly covered by the robe’s design and the way it fastened at one point across his chest and excepting a little on one shoulder where the dark material poked out, giving the smooth lines of the outfit a slightly rugged edge to it. His upper arms were wrapped in shimmering silver-gold bangles that hugged tight to his biceps and she’d given him black nail-varnish to top off the look.

Jacob was cooking in the kitchen, clearly visible through the open bedroom door as Newt was settled in front of the vanity on top of a small green ottoman whilst Queenie knelt on the carpet beside him. She’d been chattering away for most of the evening and they were both making their way through a bowl of homemade cinnamon swirls, the pastry flaking off on their fingers before Queenie did his nails and told him to stop eating them lest he ruin her work. It had been her encouragement that had settled him on the costume and as she was dressed to the nines in a spangly pink and silver flapper affair with crystal strands woven into her hair, he found himself a little less self-conscious than he otherwise might’ve been.

Even Jacob was attending, dressed to compliment Queenie’s costume by wearing what he claimed was a more historically accurate 20s outfit of large blue overalls that would’ve been worn by factory workers coming home after the war. She didn’t seem to mind, the loving glow about the two of them almost palpable and though Jared often accused the couple of being cheesy and unbearable, Newt thought it was more just sweet.

“Jacob, honey? Could you bring my drink through please?” Queenie called, and Jacob appeared a few moments later with a gin and tonic in one hand and a spoon of jam in the other. He put the former on the dresser next to them as Queenie’s hands were occupied with holding Newt’s face still as she painted something powdery on his lids and lash-line. Queenie murmured thanks to him and Newt could feel Jacob’s eyes on them. When Queenie finally released Newt’s face, he blinked a bit of glitter out of his lashes, raising a finger to gently catch it and wincing as Queenie glared admonishingly at him for it.

“See, told you it could work with the silver!” Queenie said as Newt finally looked into the mirror properly. He found himself staring.

“I never said it wouldn’t.”

“No, Jacob, silly!”

Newt looked over to Jacob and clasped one black-nail-painted hand to his heart, opening his mouth in mock appal and the baker laughed readily.

“I just figured it might look a little weird but it actually kinda suits ya.”

“Thank you, Jacob,” Newt replied, taking a sip of his own drink – something fruity and blood-coloured in a long glass that had red vampire fangs emblazoned upon it that Queenie had whipped up for him. It even had little Halloween skull sweets floating in it. She certainly went all out sometimes; 0-60 in no time flat.

“I think that about does it,” Queenie said, brushing off her hands on her flapper dress and Newt blinked down at himself before glancing up at Queenie with raised eyebrows.

“Shouldn’t I be wearing a bit more on top?”

“Nope,” she replied, not looking at him as she stowed her makeup back away into a little travel bag, zipping it shut with a decisive sound and a wide smile. “You put on any more layers, lizard-boy, and it’ll look like pyjamas.”

“I don’t know anyone who wears pyjamas like this,” Newt murmured, a little sullenly but still looking down at himself with a little smile twitching his lips. “But I suppose you’re right.”

Newt’s phone sounded and he reached over to grab it off the vanity, expecting it to be Jared messaging him that he and Graves were already at the club they were supposed to be visiting that night. He blinked as he saw it was indeed a text but not from Jared. It was from Albus. That alone had him snatching up the phone and motioning to the two that he was stepping outside onto their tiny, plant-ridden balcony, closing the door behind him and trying to ignore the cold end-of-October air on his partially exposed arms and chest. The text had been simple.

_Please put my mind to rest._

He hit call before he even really thought about it. Holding the phone to his ear in a finely trembling hand, Newt waited maybe two rings before he was answered and the relief that threaded the voice on the other end of the line was enough to make guilt well within him.

“Newt?”

“Yes, I’m sorry it took so long for me to get back to you. Things have been rather…hectic of late and I-” his sigh rattled the line as his eyes slipped shut, “I’m sorry.”

“I’m merely glad you thought to call,” Newt could hear the smile in the professor’s voice.

“Well, it seemed about time to do so,” he said, fingers curling over the iron railing as he looked out from the sixth-story balcony onto the city below. Everything was dark and twinkling but thankfully the clouds were few and far between, allowing the crescent moon to shine as brightly as might be expected across the skyline. “There were some things I needed to ask you anyway.”

“Oh?”

“Like what happened to Credence.”

There was silence on the other end of the line for a few moments before Albus’ careful tone knotted something tightly in his chest, “What exactly was it that you wanted to know?”

“Well, what actually happened to him would be a start.” Newt said, voice tight and throaty, “And then hopefully just why you didn’t think to tell me. About any of it. I would have understood.”

“I didn’t think you wouldn’t have but it-” a breath “-it would not have been safe to do so. It still isn’t.” A pause “How did you find out?” 

“Oddly enough, it came up when I was brought in for questioning about the murder of a student in the city. The detective I spoke to told me that one of the previous victims had been Credence.” He swallowed, “I had connections to more than one of the victims and as I was the one to find the latest victim, they were understandably suspicious.” There was an almost pained sound across the line and Newt founds himself clutching the phone tighter, “Albus?” 

“I’m truly sorry that you had to find out that way.”

“So am I,” Newt replied, the bitterness evident but also the sorrow. He knew that he had no right to berate Albus for making poor or possibly selfish decisions when he was grieving but Newt still wanted answers. “How- when did you find out…about Credence? Was it when-…when you left me…in your office?”

“Yes,” came the quiet reply. “It was not fair on you, Newt, but I was at a loss as to what to do at the time and I felt that I needed to distance myself from a great deal of things. Including you. I did not intend to hurt you but that doesn’t excuse the way I treated you.”

“You didn’t think to mention any of this since? It’s been _years_ , Albus.”

“I didn’t feel that it was right to disturb the new life you were building with ghosts from the past or the troubles I was going through. Or the ones that I still am.”

Newt’s eyes slipped shut again, tears burning at the backs of his lids, “You should have allowed me to make that decision for myself.”

“Perhaps I should have,” Albus conceded softly. “But the past is the past and I would be a fool to lament what I cannot change.”

Newt huffed a laugh, “Maybe.”

“But otherwise-” came the hesitant question and a poignant pause “-you are content?”

Newt sighed inwardly at the wording, “Yes, quite.”

“You're quite sure of that?”

“Yes...?”

Albus evidently sensed the hesitance therein, “Has something happened?”

Newt hesitated then, tempted to launch into everything that had occurred recently, but one look through the balcony doors over at Queenie and Jacob’s avid stares...he knew he shouldn’t. Worrying more people didn’t seem like the right thing to do. He already had too many people around him fussing and fretting and he didn’t need Albus joining the ranks. Especially not when it would encourage contact with the man that he wasn’t entirely sure he either wanted or was comfortable with. Not after all this time.

“Not too much going on anymore, I’m afraid, though I’m going out with a few friends tonight,” Newt told him with a pointedly bolstered tone colouring his speech.

“That’s good to hear,” Albus seemed genuinely glad too, “Do try to be careful.”

“Of course,” Newt replied reflexively.

“And have fun, remember that your friends and your education are more important than any other ties you may hold,” Albus added, “Your family too; give my regards to Theseus when you speak with him next.”

Newt blinked a bit in surprise, rubbing his bare arms and rotating his shoulders as he looked back to the balcony doors, spotting the couple talking animatedly “Shall do, though I think I should probably go. My friends are waiting.”

“Very well, have a good evening, Newt.”

“Thank you, you too.”

He hung up and stared out at the night sky for a little while longer before he went back inside. Queenie was in the bathroom judging by the closed door and Jacob was standing by the kitchen doorway, still holding the jammy spoon and looking like he was trying to look as inconspicuous as possible. Newt smiled good-naturedly at the older man and Jacob returned it readily, albeit a bit hesitantly before he asked, “That your boyfriend?”

Newt shook his head and laughed, “No, it wasn’t Gellert.”

Jacob’s brows rose and his big brown eyes widened, moustached lips twitching up in a disbelieving grin, “Gellert? You mean Dr Grindelwald?”

Newt did a double-take of monumental proportions, “You know him?”

“Well yeah, he’s my shrink, ain’t he?”

“I...didn’t know that.”

“I didn’t realise either – Queenie kept referring to your fella as ‘fancy pants doctor' so it was kinda hard to tell,” he laughed, “Though the name fits now that I think of it. Small world, huh?”

“S’pose it must be,” he looked at Jacob sideways as he decidedly avoided direct gaze. “I didn’t realise you were seeing a psychiatrist.”

Jacob shrugged, “I started going after my grandma died. I’d been considering it for years cause of a load of other stuff but it all got a bit too much, you know?”

Newt nodded. He could understand that.

“Dr Grindelwald’s just been so supportive, he don’t put pressure on me to talk about nothing in particular but still manages to get me talking all the same,” He shrugged again, “It's amazing what he can do and I can’t believe how much he’s helped me confront some of the issues I’ve been having. It’s been tricky, sure, but I feel like it’s been worth it so far.”

Newt could _definitely_ understand that.

“I’m glad that it’s been working out well for you, Jacob,” he paused, looking at his friend more directly now, stepping that bit closer so that Queenie was unlikely to overhear. “You do know that if you have problems, with anything, that is, you can talk to me? You do, don’t you?”

Jacob’s expression softened even as his grin widened, lightly thumping his knuckles against Newt’s arm as he did so, “Course I do! Just helps to talk to a professional sometimes, ya know? Someone who ain’t gonna judge and even if he does, he knows just what to do or say to get you going again...it’s just- different like that.”

“I get it,” Newt smiled, “He does have a certain…quality.”

“I think you might be picking up on a different quality to me buddy, but I still like him.”

Newt nodded, downing the last of his drink before acknowledging, “Makes sense.”

“So how bout you and him? Everything going alright? You’ve sure been spending a lot of time together over the past couple a weeks.”

Newt shrugged, “It’s going well, I think, as much as can be expected anyway.”

Jacob gave him an uneasy smile, evidently dubious, “How’d ya mean?”

Newt’s hands moved as he struggled to put it into words “I-…it feels like he’s holding back a fair bit and whilst I suspect its probably with good reason, I always feel like there’s something he’s not telling me or something that isn’t quite…clicking, I suppose.”

“Well, he _is_ a shrink,” Jacob offered, waving the jam spoon as he shrugged and when Newt looked at him questioningly, he expounded, “To do that sorta job, I reckon you gotta hold a lot in. I mean, I’ve been to five shrinks in the past six years and I don’t reckon that any of em could reign in their…I dunno, ‘psychiatric inclinations’, whenever they were round other people. There was one guy I had, Dr Martin, who I saw while I was in the bank this one time, and his wife, well, she didn’t look happy. Kept on snapping at everything he said and then when I went over to say hi, neither of em were exactly pleased.”

Newt nodded slowly, “Sorry, but what exactly does that have to do with me and Gellert?”

Jacob gestured with the spoon again, as if it were obvious, “No offence, Newt, but you’re kind of an oddball and I figure that the Doc is probably having trouble sortin’ through his shrinky ideas and to how he actually feels about ya, if you know what I mean?”

Newt nodded, this time understanding what his friend was saying a bit better. It made sense, but it also didn’t feel like the full explanation. Though he certainly wasn’t expecting Jacob to be the one to provide that, it did help a little…even if it still felt like an odd, gnawing thing that Gellert was acting more like he was a charity case rather than an equal. The rescues, the money, the job. It all felt like he was getting off on being the one to ‘save’ Newt and it irked the zoologist a bit that despite how well they got along together, Gellert was still withholding himself – both physically and emotionally. Despite the short length of time that they’d known each other, barely two weeks, he felt like the circumstances should have drawn them closer than it in fact had. It still felt like there was something missing. 

Queenie remerged from the bathroom then and smiled widely at both of them. “Ready to go?”

“Yeah, I’ll just get my hat,” Jacob said, reaching over to the sofa in the living room and collecting a blue canvas flat-cap. They left not long after, taking the tram and getting off at a stop just off the city centre. They got a few odd looks from passengers and passers-by but as it was nearing 10:30pm on a Halloween that happened to fall on a Friday night, most people just shrugged it off or laughed. In fact, the closer they got to the Club Arcanus, the fuller of partying students the streets became, people drunk off their arses and staggering about, scaring the living daylights out of anyone and everyone they could do. Newt also noticed a great deal of exposed skin – girls, mainly, but also half-naked blokes. Despite his own costume being rather more revealing than the frigid October air might warrant, Newt could only feel kind of glad that he was wearing more than the muscled blonde bloke in nothing but an adult nappy and an oversized baby hat who Queenie waved to as she knew him from class. Whatever the thinking behind that costume was, Newt didn’t really want to know. It was a bleedin’ circus!

They made it inside the warehouse building that Arcanus was housed in with only about a five-minute-wait in line as Queenie had had the forethought to book tickets ahead; she was surprisingly fastidious that way when it came to having fun and going out. Newt offered to collect the drinks from the bar for everyone but Jacob insisted on doing so with the excuse of Newt’s injuries making him likely to drop them but Newt got the feeling that he was feeling a little uncomfortable about hanging around a younger crowd of people as a man in his mid-thirties. He needn’t have. Jacob was a thoroughly likeable person and someone that people just seemed to be comfortable around no matter what the man said. Besides, it wasn’t much later that Graves and Jared turned up.

Newt couldn’t help but raise a slightly exasperated eyebrow at Graves’ lack of effort costume-wise. He was wearing yet another dark suit, top-buttons undone, dark tie on white shirt. The only arguable difference was that his jacket collar was flared up dramatically and his slicked-back hair seemed to gleam a little more than usual in the flashing red and green lights overhead – implying an excess of product. As he and Jared got closer, Newt could’ve sworn he saw a hint of eyeliner and shadow marking Graves’ eyes, making their umber depths deepen to something seemingly-infinite but otherwise, it seemed he hadn’t made the effort Jared had. As subtle as ever, Jared had gone for a full cowboy costume complete with hat, sheriff’s badge and even spurred boots. Minus a shirt, of course. and the leather waistcoat he wore stretched flatteringly over a stout, tanned chest. Though neither approaching man looked anywhere near as ridiculous as they probably should have. 

Fortunately, Jacob arrived a moment later and pressed drinks into both Newt’s and Queenie’s hands and Newt took a deep swig. _Unfortunately_ , this happened at the exact same moment Graves chose to look Newt over with a keen eye before drawling with a bemused smirk, “Try having mercy on me will you, oh terrifying dark lord? I’m not sure if I could stand a verbal dress-down tonight with you dressed like…that.”

Newt inhaled the sip he took, choked for a few moments before glaring through watering eyes at Graves and his friends laughed around him. Jared seemed to be having a tough time keeping his tight-fitting leather waistcoat from popping a button as he guffawed into his own drink. When he’d recovered enough to speak, Newt pushed his hair back into its slicked-dark style and cocked an eyebrow, “At least I made an effort. Where’s your costume, Graves?”

The man in question shrugged looking down at himself with a nonchalant smirk playing on his lips and a glass of something amber held loosely in one hand. “What? I’m a psychopath,” at the questioning looks he received, his smile morphed into something quite different and admittedly a little sinister as he clarified, “They can look like anyone.”

There was a collective ‘aaaah’ of understanding from the group, then laughter. Though Newt felt Graves’s eyes linger on him a little longer, the gesture feeling significant somehow.

“And the guyliner?” Queenie probed.

“Just a personal preference.” 

“I’ll bet,” Jared muttered into his drink before grinning back up at Newt after he drank, “Hey, you’re matching.”

Newt rolled his eyes, following suit with the deep gulps of alcohol – suddenly feeling that getting as drunk as his friends had suggested was actually not such a terrible idea. Luckily, it was a strong cocktail drink that tasted both sweet and sour somehow. Whatever it was, it was good. They gradually moved out onto the dancefloor and whilst Newt was not the biggest dancer – excluding a few cultural mating dances that would not _ever_ see the light of day - the more he drank, the more his hips began moving in rhythm with the music and his eyes drifted closed, feeling the vibrations of the floor and everyone moving around him running up through his body. It was about three drinks and a couple of hours later that he next really focussed on anything around him, opening his eyes properly and smiled unconsciously as he saw Jacob and Queenie dancing together closely towards the middle of the dancefloor and that Jared was currently grinding against a handsome afroed man in a policeman’s costume. Clearly, Jared had a type. Or perhaps a kink. 

Belatedly, Newt realised that left him alone – relatively – with Graves, and his stomach sunk a little as he turned to face the man, awkwardly sucking the remnants of his drink with his lips sealed tight around the red straw in preference to having to think of something to say to the older man. Graves was watching him, he noticed, with a small smile curving his lips and what must’ve been his fourth or fifth drink in hand. A high tolerance to alcohol must be a prerequisite to being both a detective and a friend of Jared. 

Newt abashedly lowered his drink but the straw somehow got stick to the gloss that Queenie had applied earlier that night and he had to reach up and pull it away, leaving a slight bloody red smear on the plastic. He didn’t quite know how they ended up dancing together but he _did_ know when Graves’ hand slipped to touch his waist. He became very aware of it because of the way his robe had slipped slightly to the side and Graves’ hands, whilst probably a normal temperature, felt cool against his flushed skin.

_‘In pitch dark, I go walking in your landscape, broken branches trip me as I speak’_

He blearily noticed the Radiohead song playing in the background, the beat thumping through them in an odd juxtaposition to the way everyone in the room was moving. The only motions that seemed to fit were the way that Graves’ hands were on him, thumb dipping into the slip of his waist and those smoky mahogany eyes intent on his face. 

_‘Just 'cause you feel it, doesn't mean it's there’_

Newt’s head drifted forwards, drawn towards Graves as the room thrummed around them, the ice opening beneath him.

_‘There's always a siren, singing you to shipwreck’_

Graves was frowning now, for some reason, but he wasn’t getting any further away either. In fact, his eyes seemed to be glued on Newt’s – smudged lip gloss and all.

_‘Don't reach out, don't reach out’_

Newt’s drink was dropped, forgotten somewhere along the way on the floor, the plastic cup trampled beneath dancing, moving feet whilst he and Graves had moved closer and all of a sudden, all Newt could think of was the way the music was pulling – as it said – like a siren’s call towards the other man’s lips.

_‘Steer away from these rocks, we'd be a walking disaster’_

He followed it. The kiss was soft, hesitant at first but soon became something dirty and desperate. Like they were gripping onto one another with the motion, devouring each other’s pain and dissipating it between them by doing so.

_‘Why so green and lonely? Lonely, lonely…Heaven sent you to me, we are accidents waiting…waiting to happen’_

Graves tasted like sorrow and salt. Like whiskey and something warm and familiar he couldn’t quite place and Newt’s hands wrapped around the older man, cupping his neck and holding him to him, tangling in his hair and mussing the finely sculpted grooves into an abysmal mess. Neither cared. Not as Newt pressed chest to chest with Graves or when the detective’s hands found the dip of Newt’s back and the curve of his arse. None of it mattered except for that exquisite, exceptional contact. The same kind that Gellert had been teasing him with for weeks now. Teasing and denying Newt the one thing that he felt he needed right now.

The thought of Gellert, however, was enough to pull him away from Graves. Tear the contact apart and have the zoologist stumble back, panting and blind-sided into the crowd, not hearing the protests that followed as he moved through the throng of people out into the open space nearer the bathrooms. He fled within, pushing past a few people and locking himself into a cubicle without proper thought, feeling the arousal and pain thrumming through him in an overwhelming way he couldn’t ignore. Felt that drown him. Worse than the frigid waters he’d been dreaming of for weeks. God, he couldn’t breathe. 

An indefinable amount of time later, there was a knock at the door and he slammed his hand into the door on pure, admittedly drunken, impulse, feeling the pain shoot to his brain like an electric shock and he moaned, groaning low in his throat against the sensation until he heard a familiar voice ring out.

“Look, Newt, I’m sorry if I took advantage, but if you’re sick, I’d rather just get you home rather than leave you hurling in a bathroom stall.”

“M’not sick,” Newt called out throatily, head pressed against the scarred, heavily graffitied surface of the cubicle stall. “Yet anyway,” he muttered to himself.

Graves clearly heard, however, as he replied, “Maybe you should come out here so I can judge for myself.”

Newt groaned and opened the door on impulse and then groaned again as Graves squeezed into the stall beside him and locked the door behind him. Newt looked at him through slitted eyelids and moaned yet again into the wall under his breath. “Did you have to come in here?”

“Well, after you kissed me, yes,” was the mildly aggravated reply. 

“That was-…that was-”

“That was what?”

Newt crumpled, “I don’t know.”

Graves’ hands were in his pockets and he looked dubious in the extreme as he asked, “Did it feel good?”

“I felt good,” Newt admitted quietly and Graves reached over with one hand, tipping Newt’s head up to meet his gaze.

“Then you don’t need any more explanation than that.”

Newt blinked, confused, and Graves laughed low under his breath before looking up at Newt through his heavily dark-tinted lashes. “Newt, you’ve been through a lot recently and if you feel like this is good, even if it’s not right, then why shouldn’t you do it?”

“Because-” Newt half-sputtered, “Because it’s not right…” His voice trailed off and he found himself looking at Graves’ lips again, parted and pink as they were. God, he was getting distracted again. Couldn’t he focus on anything else?!

“I’ve seen this a thousand times. Hell, I’ve _been_ here a hundred times. You feel like shit, you see some idiot who happens to be close and appealing in the moment and you go for it cause you’re feeling vulnerable – it’s nothing to be ashamed of. You just need to pick your moment and your idiot.” 

Newt stared a while longer and then smiled, laughed under his breath and intended to draw back, to turn and unlock the bathroom stall and go back to his friends, go home – go anywhere that wasn’t here. In a bathroom in oddly similar circumstances to the first voluntary meeting he’d had with Gellert. God, when had it all got so complicated and laden with pitfalls of deja’vu. Or perhaps it really was kismet. Outside, on the pounding environment of the club central, a song started to play and as the words _‘caught me under false pretences’_ began filtering through the stall walls, Newt stopped caring about whether Graves’ words held any merit. Or whether he was going to hell for what he was about to do. He caught Graves’ lips in a swift, fierce kiss before he slid to his knees before the older man, nuzzling his face into the detective’s crotch before the older man could even really register the movement. Newt’s fingers got to work on Graves’ belt, unbuckling it and pulling it out in one swift motion, casting it aside for the time being as he moved to the button and zipper in quick succession.

Graves wasn’t even capable of speech it seemed as Newt began to mouth over the bulge that was rapidly growing within his black boxers, tonguing the slit and tasting the salty dampness through the cotton before he even breached that final layer.

“Shit, shit, _Newt_ -”

Newt took that as encouragement and dug his nimble fingers into the top of his boxers, tugging them down to just below his thighs, too eager to even bother with the full motion to get them off. Focussing more on getting _Graves_ off instead as he wrapped his stinging, sticky lips around the older man’s cock. He sucked for all he was worth, tonguing the head, running his thumb along the vein that traced the bottommost side of the cock in his mouth. He tasted like salt and sin and almost as much desperation as the kiss, though that might have just been Newt’s own interpretation leaking through as he took the detective to the back of his throat with little trouble indeed, his gag reflex kicked out by both the drink and his own energy. He tasted too good, the thickness filling him and settling his mind into that right space that assuaged every fear and inkling of self-loathing or embarrassment he might’ve otherwise felt. A soothing sensation, familiar even in its individual unfamiliarity and Newt took deep pleasure in the fact that it didn’t take Graves all that long to spill across his tongue. It was something he could do. Had been denied and now relished in being able to draw and cause pleasure from another man. It was an old comfort. But with a new level of meaning in that Graves felt different from most others, a different motion and a different temperament that almost stung to behold. 

His body ached as he knelt, milking the last traces from Graves, tongue flicking over the head and suckling on it as he withdrew, the hand that wasn’t braced against the stall wall behind Newt’s head helped the zoologist up and then they were kissing again, Graves’ tongue digging into Newt’s mouth as he chased the taste from him with the burn of cheap whiskey. Graves’s hands were pushing at the edges of Newt’s trousers now, tentatively almost as if asking for permission and his suspicion was confirmed moments later as Graves’ head pulled back and he asked into Newt’s throat, “Newt, can I-…are you sure about this?”

Newt didn’t say anything, just pressed his thigh in between Graves’ legs and pressed forward until it began to create some friction. Graves half-strangled a groan as the friction met his exposed, over-sensitised cock but then forcibly gripped Newt by the shoulders and pushed him back, the zoologist’s shoulder blade slamming into the stall wall with the motion and the pain of it sent white-hot firecrackers of cognizance back through his brain, so much so that he whimpered past the pain of the collision itself. Graves was closer in a moment, apology clear in his eyes but also a sad, pained kind of acceptance. “I’m sorry, but that needed to be done.”

Newt almost glared at him then, almost became belligerent, but then he merely pressed his eyes closed momentarily and nodded shakily, “Yes you most certainly did.” He opened his eyes a bit clearer this time, “I’m sorry.”

Graves huffed a laugh that sounded bitter in the extreme, “Don’t be. It’s not that I don’t want this – I do, I _really_ do…but not like this and I don’t want you regretting anything once you’ve sobered up.”

Newt snorted, “I didn’t do that because I’m drunk, Graves, I did it because I wanted to. I’m not quite as innocent as you seem to think. I do have experience in this sort of thing.”

“I could tell,” Graves grunted, tucking himself back away into his trousers rather pointedly as he did so, zipping up and looking around for his belt, seeing it half-tangled around Newt’s ankle on the floor and hesitating. The zoologist smiled softly and reached down, albeit painedly to retrieve it for him, holding it tightly for a few moments before handing it over to the detective. Their hands brushed as he did so and despite being the tiniest jot more sober with the pain still fresh in his senses, the arousal still thrummed strong. He was about to withdraw Graves’ fingers caught his wrist, twining and twisting the belt so that it created a loose loop around the younger’s man’s wrist. Newt’s eyes widened as he looked from the loose – easily escapable loop – up to Graves’ burning eyes and saw something rekindle there, something determined as Graves stepped that bit closer, his voice a murmur hot against Newt’s cheek. “It doesn’t seem fair to leave you wanting.”

Newt’s throat closed up and he shook his head just the tiniest bit before attempting to swallow the feeling away.

“No, that wouldn’t be very gentlemanly of me at all, I think.”

Newt found his voice, “Tit for tat?”

Graves breathed a laugh and pressed a kiss the spot just behind Newt’s ear. “That wasn’t quite what I had in mind but yes…‘tit for tat.’”

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Newt’s eyes slipped closed as Graves’ lips found his neck again, mouthing and soothing and kissing as the detective’s hand pushed into his pants, pushing down the dark material whilst the other hand moved up to press over the zoologist’s mouth. Newt breathed deeply into the grip, breath warm and even against his palm as Graves mapped the path down his neck to his collarbone, lips slipping beneath the dyed black bandages as he reached his shoulder, nipping gently and teasingly at each bit of skin he found beneath the layers. Graves’ fingers moved to the small of Newt’s back, skimming past his erection and across his hips as he did so, smiling into Newt’s skin at the muffled moan he received in response. Being somewhat soberer, Graves was aware of the other people in the bathroom but only as a distant, mild irritation; he was more focussed on the soft skin under him and the way those big, beautiful eyes were open again and fixed on his, looking obscene somehow above the strong hand pressed over his mouth, the edge of Graves’ thumb grazing Newt’s nose, threatening the possibility of blocking it off but never quite doing so as he reduced the zoologist to writhing against the stall wall. He couldn’t tease for too long, not without working himself up too much again and he quickly spun the younger man, pressing against him just enough for Newt to feel him against his ass, leaving his upper half unincumbered except for the hand pressed between his mouth and the wall.

Newt was gasping against his palm now and Graves eased off the grip just the tiniest bit as his fingers first went to his own lips and then sought out the small, puckered furl between the young man’s legs, pressing in just slightly with the spit-slicked digits. Newt jerked but was soon pressing back and Graves needed no more encouragement as he eased one finger in, starting up a steady rhythm before adding another and scissoring, pulling them apart within Newt and smirking into his neck as he heard a low moan ripple through the younger man. His fingers crept deeper until they found just the spot he'd been seeking and Newt moaned again, his nails scrabbling a little frantically at Graves’ hips behind him, trying to find some sort of purchase as before him was only smooth stall wall, too high to grip over the top of even for the gangly zoologist. He was working the fingers in and out at a furious pace, adding another and revelling in each low, shuddering exhale he received in response to the stimulation.

Graves pressed his lips back to that spot behind Newt’s ear, trying very hard all of a sudden not to notice the hickeys that lined the younger man’s throat, just in sight as his collar had slipped; thinking of Grindelwald being anywhere near Newt was unnerving in the extreme but to have the evidence of their closeness so plainly laid out before him...it put a spur in his actions and his hand swiftly found Newt’s cock, working it almost roughly, his fingers caressing the shaft, nail lightly teasing the slit and one thumb dropping to massage his sack. It didn’t take long after that, with Graves’ fingers in his ass, lips against his neck and the side of his flushed face and a firm grip on his cock. He came with a muffled shout, muffled by his own hand this time as he pressed it over his mouth, breathing heavily, eyelids drooping momentarily before his eyes opened again, bright and sharp as he turned his head to kiss Graves over his own shoulder. It was a softer kiss this time, grateful almost but lingering with tinges of sweat and a little sadness. But when Graves opened his eyes and withdrew enough to see the younger man’s face, he didn’t see any excess of guilt. Not yet anyway. But Newt was too damn soft-hearted and empathetic for his own good to be feeling that way for long.

Graves pulled some tissue out of the dispenser on the wall behind him and passed it over to Newt, their hands brushing again as Graves then didn’t release the tissue and guided Newt’s hand as they worked together to clean him up. Newt wasn’t avoiding looking at him any more than usual, per se, but there seemed to be a slightly spaced edge to the lack of eye contact that had been almost absurdly absent during their intimacy. Despite being crammed into the stall together that couldn’t have been more than a few-feet-squared, the Brit seemed awfully far away all of a sudden. Graves could’ve kicked himself for doing this, for rushing it and potentially driving the young man away when Graves was supposed to be _protecting_ him…not getting hot and heavy in a bathroom stall. Shit.

But then something unexpected and kind of wonderful happened.

Newt had just finished straightening his clothes, Graves’ hand brushing against the younger man’s shoulder as he helped right a bandage that had slipped, revealing the still deep bruising and slight scrape left from the zoologist’s beating. The detective had had to work hard not to press a kiss to the deep purplish-red mark when Newt had turned to face him, soft and close, eyes fixed on Graves’ jawline before they skated up to meet his. And he smiled. A soft thing, a touch guilty, but genuine as he tipped Graves’ chin up to press one last soft kiss to his lips before he slipped from the stall, leaving the American standing under the questioning, amused stares of a few people left in the bathroom of Club Arcanus. 


	14. How Very Strange

**Chapter 14**

**31 st October – 1st November **

**‘ _How very strange I ever kissed you_**

_A little aphrodisia_

**_It seems so improbable now_ **

_A little anaesthesia_

**_How strange that when you left, I missed you_ **

**_I can't think why, I can't think how_ **

_In everything you took in_

**_I thought you walked out of some dream_ **

_With a side-line in voodoo_

**_But now the way I felt toward you_ **

**_I find puzzling in the extreme for this_ **

_I feel as you do_

_My hobby's psychopharmacology’_

_‘_ **_How very strange’ – Future Bible Heroes_ **

Newt made it out onto the dancefloor again without mishap, looking around for his friends but all seemed to be mysteriously absent. He’d expect that of Jared after seeing him with the policeman-costumed bloke from earlier but was distantly surprised that Queenie and Jacob had vanished too. Maybe they’d gone home. Maybe they’d been looking for him. But then again, it was very hard to tell much of anything with all the people, costumes, lights and movement. The fact that he was still rather tipsy wasn’t helping matters either and he soon found himself gravitating towards the bar, ordering some water and downing it in quick gulps that smeared his lip-gloss even more than Graves had. He knew he must look a frightful mess but no one was really looking close enough at him to notice. Newt wasn’t entirely sure if leaving Graves like that had been the best idea but judging by his choices thus far tonight, he thought it had probably followed the trend of poor decisions.

He left not long after he’d downed a second cup of water and then thumbed out a predominantly auto-corrected text to Queenie and Jared, telling them that he was going home. Queenie did not reply but Jared sent him a short message contradicting the zoologist’s suspicions that the Texan had simply left rather than invited his dance partner back to his flat. He couldn’t help but wonder why but supposed that maybe Jared just hadn’t gotten along with the other man quite as well as it’d looked and wanted to call it an early night instead. Or at least what Jared would consider an early night anyway.

Newt realised that as it was nearing one-thirty in the morning, he ended up flagging down an Uber and it was just past two by the time he was back at his flat. He couldn’t sit still the entire ride back, his loosened hole and the liquid feel of his aching, post-orgasmic body causing him to squirm in his seat to such a degree that the driver asked if needed to stop to find a bathroom. Newt flushed and declined, subduing his discomfort to something subtler even as his body continued to remind him of everything that had just happened. Even if his mind was quite resolutely ignoring it. Most especially the way he could still feel the ghost of the soft kiss he'd left Graves with. Nope, not going to think about that at all.

After exiting the car and approaching his place, he had a thoroughly unpleasant feeling of deja’vu as he saw that the lights were on in his flat and when he entered – very cautiously – he found that he was not alone in terms of human company. Thankfully, it was only Gellert and to Newt’s immense surprise, the doctor was asleep on his sofa. He must have let himself in with the spare key that Newt had given him when he’d found that everyday tasks such as carrying shopping were incredibly difficult to manage with his arm in a sling as it had been. Gellert had offered to help him with such things and since then, Newt had found a definite quality increase of the food left in his cupboards despite the doctor’s assurance that he’d spent no more on it than Newt usually would’ve. Newt had been fairly certain that was a bald-faced lie as none of the produce had plastic packaging on from Lidl or Tesco and the zoologist got the feeling that it was of the expensive organic variety only bought at upscale markets. And judging by the delicious smells wafting through the air of his flat, Newt knew that was once again the case. He even went to the courtesy of not preparing meat dishes in Newt’s flat for himself as the smell of cooking meat made both the zoologist and some of his companions skittish.

Newt wasn’t sure if he could possibly feel more guilty at that moment as he saw several covered dishes sitting on the table in his kitchen and that Gellert had a bouquet of black and red flowers lying on his lap, tied with black ribbons in neat bows. Lila was curled up against his pinstripe-suited thigh, half-dozing too but still watching both men with suspicious and sleepy dark eyes. 

Oh buggeration.

Newt’s good hand came up to push his mussed hair back into some semblance of sanity, the product apparently not having been enough to keep it in check and the copper curls once again haphazardly falling about his face; not that he was particularly surprised. He crouched down onto the floor before Gellert, gently touching his hand in an attempt to wake him without startling the older man. There was part of him that hoped Gellert might sleep on until after Newt had showered and slept a bit of the stench of guilt off of himself but knew that that would only make matters worse. He wasn’t the cheating kind, not really, and if he had any hope of not hurting Gellert more than he already had, he couldn’t hide this. Shouldn’t even try to.

He quietly slid off his boots and socks as he got closer and it took a few careful shakes before the older man’s eyes roved under his lids and then gradually slid open. He smiled at Newt once his mismatched eyes blinked into proper focus and it was a sweet, hazier thing that Newt was used to and it killed him as he smiled back but Gellert evidently saw that his heart wasn’t quite in it. Gellert stretched, his joints cracking a little as his arm habitually wrapped around Newt’s shoulder when the zoologist levered himself awkwardly up onto the sofa beside him. He did not lean into the embrace as he usually might’ve.

“How was your night?”

“I’m so terribly sorry-…I didn’t realise that you had plans or else I would’ve-”

Gellert cut across him with a patient smile, “It’s quite alright, Newt, calm yourself. It was meant to be a surprise.” He tilted his head slightly, “And an apology of sorts.”

The guilt in Newt’s throat felt like it was choking him and his eyes slid closed momentarily, his breathing feeling strained. “An apology? Whatever for?”

Gellert exhaled a breath, “I realise that I haven’t been particularly attentive of you as of late and I had intended to remedy that tonight.” He chuckled quietly, “Perhaps I should have checked your schedule beforehand.”

“I didn’t know I was going anywhere until yesterday, really – Jared’s idea, spur of the moment sort of thing for me, s’pose,” Newt told him, a little distractedly and Gellert nodded, seemingly unconcerned by the fact that Newt had ruined his apparently romantic plans for the evening in more ways than the elder yet knew. “I’m just sorry that you waited so long,” Newt laughed nervously but then the expression dropped, sliding like slick off his face to reveal the distressed visage underneath, “No, that’s not all I’m sorry for.”

Gellert didn’t say anything, merely watched him as the younger man struggled to put the words together to explain what had happened in a way that wouldn’t sound too damning and to properly explain the way he felt and why he’d done what he’d done. Unfortunately, he couldn’t quite put that together in his head either. Gellert was as painfully helpful as ever – painful in that it made Newt feel all the worse for what he was going to confess – as he prompted him. “So where did you go?”

“A club that Queenie knows, Arcanus I think it was called. Very busy, very bright, a lot of alcohol and costumes and people,” Newt said, blinking rather rapidly so that he could attempt to clear the spots forming in them. Weirdly enough, the warm weight of Gellert against his side was not helping so he instead curled his fingers into the red fur of Lila laying between them, a solid, fluffy barrier who nosed into his hand, scenting him and looking for food no doubt.

“Sounds like you had fun,” Gellert remarked with about as dryness as he would have expected and he smiled a bit despite himself.

Gellert’s eyes lingered on Newt’s outfit for a few moments then, taking in each and every aspect with equal amounts of dubiousness and what seemed to be growing interest until the zoologist flushed, cleared his throat and blurted: “Graves was there.”

Gellert looked at him evenly but there was something in his eyes that hardened a fraction as he asked, “Is it not considered strange for someone of his-” he paused almost delicately before substituting “-ilk to be at a club frequented by academics of your generation?”

Newt winced a little as he shrugged, “Maybe, honestly most people didn’t notice either him or Jacob. In fact, I believe that Jacob and Queenie are still there. Jared nearly ended up going home with someone but apparently changed his mind at the last minute and I…I decided to go home instead.”

“And Graves?”

“I don’t know,” Newt admitted, “I left before he did.” He knew he was avoiding, his brain whirring as it tried to keep up with what he was going to say. It wasn’t as if Gellert wasn’t giving him opportunities to fess up here. He was just struggling to do it. Good God, he was such a coward.

Gellert shifted beside him, eyes going toward the kitchen table and checking his watch briefly before looking back to Newt. “If you’re hungry, I believe that dinner won’t suffer too much from being re-heated.”

Newt nodded mutely and shifted to let Gellert stand and watched as the doctor collected the covered plates, tipping the contents into the pans he had used and placing them in the still-warm oven to heat, Newt smiling sadly as Gellert explained the menu he’d prepared: “An ethically sourced feta omelette seasoned with chives and dill.” The freshly heated dish was placed in front of Newt mere minutes later when the zoologist sat down the table and he ducked his head in thanks as Gellert placed a second dish beside him, “Accompanied by courgette flowers sautéed with honey and vinegar.”

Newt found himself staring down at the beautifully presented food rather than eating it, hands hovering above the cutlery Gellert had set out and it wasn’t until Gellert’s hand came over to touch his that he realised the older man was already sat down and was watching him with curious, quietly concerned eyes. The absurdity of everything that had happened and was currently happening caught up with Newt all in one quick rush then and he barely stifled a squeak of laughter that he slapped a hand to his mouth to hold in. His eyes began watering and he blearily looked down at his own black bandaged arms and all the black, gold, glitter and silver that he was still entrenched in. God, not two hours ago, he had had another’s man’s fingers up his arse as he had jacked Newt off in a club bathroom. What sort of person went from _that_ to sitting opposite his…he didn’t even know what Gellert was – and settling in to eat a thoughtful home-cooked dinner with him? It was despicable.

He pushed his chair back rather abruptly and paced over to his bedroom, getting irritated as the long robe caught on his feet as he walked and he tugged angrily at it, ripping it off and casting it aside, feeling that the surge of pain his injuries punished him with was thoroughly justified. He stepped into the bathroom, turning on the tap and furiously scrubbing at his face and hair with wet, shaking hands. The makeup wouldn’t come off that easily, however, and he was left with raccoon-like circles smudged around his eyes even as he scrubbed harder and he eventually gave up, turning off the tap, drying off his hands on a lone grey t-shirt from the floor and then sliding the garment on to cover his half-naked state. Every movement hurt and he supposed he had the alcohol to thank for numbing the night’s activities from his senses until now, but – just like everything else the alcohol had kept at bay – the aches overtook him pretty quickly as he left the bathroom to face the music. 

“Did something happen tonight, Newt? Something that you do not seem comfortable sharing...or even considering really?” Gellert was standing by the bathroom door, a safe distance away, nearer the sofa than Newt but still close enough that Newt could see the worry in his eyes. Newt swallowed thickly and nodded. “And am I to surmise that this had something to do with Detective Graves being there?”

Again, Newt nodded and this time found his voice, low and throaty as it was, “Yes...something happened.”

A sigh. “I was somewhat afraid something like this might happen,”

Newt blinked twice in rapid succession, realised that his vision was no better for it, and then blinked again, “How do you-” he swallowed “-how’d you mean?”

Gellert looked at him with something that Newt couldn’t quite place. “Graves. He’s always had a…predilection for taking advantage of younger men. And I couldn’t help but notice that you seemed to have a preference yourself.”

“Taking advantage?” Newt asked, slightly aghast before he shook his head, “Something happened, yes, but I wouldn’t really call it taking advantage.” His shoulder flared in pain when he gestured as he spoke, almost as if in warning, but he did not heed it. Didn’t take the off-ramp that Gellert had just offered and instead told the truth with that heavy feeling almost choking the words out of him. “It was a mutual thing, Gellert. I’m not going to say that alcohol didn’t play a role in what happened but he most certainly wasn’t taking advantage. I-…I kissed him and though I was also the one who left after we-…” his cheeks flared bright and hot with shame but he didn’t look away from Gellert’s oddly blank face, “-after we…became intimate…it wasn’t quite what you seem to think it was.”

Gellert’s eyes flared with something indefinable but then he was quiet for a moment before he asked in a controlled, almost patient tone, “I am not going to ask for specifics as I’m not entirely sure I want to know what he did to you or whether you enjoyed it…but I will ask you this…is it because I have been withholding the physical intimacy that you wanted that you went to him, or was it something deeper?”

Newt thought about it; _had_ been thinking about it in the scant few hours since it had happened and then slowly shook his head, “I honestly couldn’t say for certain why I kissed him but…the-…what happened afterwards-…I’m reasonably certain that it was because I wanted you and I wasn’t quite sure how to ask for it, not really. Things are different now than what I’ve had experience with before, and with Graves…it felt simpler.” The words were true and as he spoke them, the realisations came a little easier, the words awakening the truth of it all, at least a bit.

His eyes met Gellert’s mismatched ones and felt something twist further in his gut at the indefinable emotions playing across Gellert’s face. “I suppose I thought that you must have your own reasons for going slowly and I can’t tell you how much I respect that but I suppose I-…it rather got away from me and I did something reprehensible to try to make myself feel better about it all. It was a…a compulsion and I didn’t ignore it as I should have,” he glanced towards the dinner and the flowers about the room. “I understand it if you hate me right about now. You did something very nice for me whilst I was out doing something-…I-…I betrayed you.”

“I do not hate you, Newt. In fact, I don’t believe that I could,” he stepped forward, his hand coming up to grip Newt’s shoulder, fingers digging in through the light grey t-shirt though Newt felt as if he were being _remarkably_ restrained given the situation. “You are correct in thinking that I have my own reasons for going slowly – reasons at least partly unrelated to your injured state. There was a part of me that was concerned that you would think I was using you if things developed between us too quickly. Given the circumstances under which we met and how matters have progressed since, I would not blame you for thinking that I was expecting something of you sexually and I didn’t want you to think that I was attempting to bribe or buy your affections.” 

Newt laughed a watery, not at all amused laugh and closed his eyes, “I’ll admit there _was_ a part of me that suspected that. A little.” He opened his eyes then and eyed Gellert with extreme scepticism, “But that’s not really the point of this conversation though, is it? I mean, I cheated on you for goodness sake!”

Gellert’s eyes flickered to the ground momentarily, in a rare show of something like uncertainty and it hurt Newt more than anything in that moment before Gellert looked up to him again, eyes harder than before but still far too understanding. “I’m not going to pretend that the thought of Graves touching you is not-” he paused and seemed to spit out the next word as his nails dug into Newt’s shoulder with finite force “- _repugnant,_ or that I’m not sorely tempted to find that opportunistic sot and flay him to within an inch of his miserable life-” the anger burning in Gellert’s tone and eyes abated as he took a breath, seeming to calm himself and Newt found that somehow the genuine fear he felt in those few moments assuaged just a fraction of the guilt within him as the elder continued in a careful tone “-however, I see no reason why this should destroy what we have.”

His hand on Newt’s shoulder rubbed a little bit at where his nails had caused stinging impressions on the zoologist's skin before drawing back, not away but stroking down Newt’s arm to briefly brush his wrist and then take his hand into his. “I care very much about you, Newt and if you feel the same way, I believe that should be enough to work with for now.” His other hand went to Newt chin and tipped it up so that their eyes met properly and Gellert smiled softly, sadly but a touch hopefully too. “Do you feel the same way?”

“I think I do,” Newt said quietly and when Gellert kissed him, it was equally as soft as the zoologist’s tone. “And I’m sorry that I ever doubted your intentions. You’ve made it abundantly clear that I should not have been concerned in the first place. At least not in this.”

It was a brief thing and when Gellert withdrew, he gestured toward the laid table and said, “Are you still hungry?” Newt nodded and joined the elder at the table, this time eating, albeit slowly and with his gaze fixed upon the plate and its contents before Gellert spoke up again a while later. “I would appreciate it very much if you would promise me something, Newt.” The younger man looked up in question and Gellert’s eyes were flinty and unreadable once more as he said, “I don’t want you to spend any more time with Detective Graves. It’s not that I don’t trust you but I have learned from experience that he is capable of a great deal and I would not put it past him to do it again.”

“He said something similar of you,” Newt blurted before he could stop himself and though Gellert’s eyes narrowed a fraction, he gave away no more than that before Newt nodded, “But yes, I understand. Though I have to say that he rather makes a habit of showing up in unexpected places, I promise that I won’t spend any more time with him than I can help.”

“I appreciate your candour,” Gellert’s hand brushed his on the table in a way reminiscent of how it did when they went to dinner for the first time, the memory setting the guilt aside just a little in wake of fond reminiscence “I had hoped that it wouldn’t come to this. That I would not have to ask you to isolate yourself from anyone you know because of me, but I do believe that under the circumstances, my concern is warranted.”

Newt ducked his head to examine the remnants of food on the plate beneath him. “Gellert, I can’t tell you how sorry I am that I put you in a position like this in the first place. My being…frustrated doesn’t excuse any of this and I’m honestly having a great deal of trouble understanding why you’re being so…understanding about this. I mean, I cheated on you with someone you know and don’t seem to like very much either.”

“Well, the parameters of our relationship have not been particularly well-defined up until now, so, arguably, there is no ‘cheating’ to be spoken of, even if the betrayal is undeniable,” Gellert told him and relished in the visible cringe of the younger man, rubbing his skin comfortingly before continuing, “Perhaps putting matters into a more defined perspective might help?”

Newt could blame the tiredness, lingering medication and booze for the teasing look he darted up through his mussed hair at Gellert then, “Is that your way of saying you’re my boyfriend now?”

Gellert exhaled a slight laugh and squeezed Newt’s hand indulgently, “Yes, yes, it is.”

Newt ducked his head and his smiled died before meeting Gellert’s eye again, “But in all seriousness…is there anything I can do to even begin making this up to you?”

Gellert took a bit of his food, chewing and swallowing at a sedate pace before he answered without looking up from his food, “If I think of anything, I’ll be sure to let you know in a timely fashion and do not think that I have forgotten how much you prefer a…firmer hand. I most surely will not when considering just how deeply this may have affected me.”

“Alright…if you’re sure…” Newt murmured, eyes going back to the bouquet lying forgotten on the sofa in the next room, distantly realising that they weren’t actually roses but a mixture of Red Dahlia, Camellia and Sedum. The last one struck him particularly both as strange and somewhat poignant. If he remembered correctly, the meaning of Sedum flowers as a gift was that of heartbreak. 

* * *

He waited until Newt was asleep in his arms in those wee hours of the morning before allowing the simmering rage within him to begin flowing more fluidly through his bloodstream, fuelling him as he proficiently slid out from beside the zoologist, leaving him slumbering soundly in his bed as he paced, shirtless and pale in his fury to the window. He had had enough forewarning from the Goldstein girl so that he was able to temper his rage but it had been a near thing; nearer than he would have liked but, ultimately, this betrayal might just end up working further in his favour. Gellert had managed to successfully discourage Newt from seeing Graves and the guilt alone should be enough to ensure that any attempts the detective might make to the contrary would prove unsuccessful. But that still didn’t stop the rage. Gellert prided himself on being a man who could channel his negative feelings into productivity and that was precisely what he was doing here as he procured his phone from his suit jacket and began to type. It wasn’t a spur of the moment decision but once again with Newt Scamander, Gellert found himself escalating his plans more quickly than he might have liked. But then again, things like this required sacrifices and ingenuity.

Once he had finished making the necessary arrangements, he moved about the flat with light steps, checking the buttonhole cameras that Grimmson and his lackeys had taken the liberty to install for him when they had paid Newt a visit the week previous. They had certainly been useful, but the next step would only be hindered if they were discovered and he took care in removing each one, stowing all five of them away in the hidden pocket in the lining of his jacket. It wouldn’t do for Newt to find them after all and besides, he still had the cameras outside the flat and the trace on Newt’s phone and laptop to let him know of the young man’s whereabouts. He left very little to chance. 

Gellert was aware of every call and text Newt sent and as such, knew that Albus – whilst being predictably, though cautiously meddlesome – was abiding by the rules and not trying something that would end very poorly indeed for both him and Newt. Graves, however, was a different matter. He seemed to not be going by a direct approach but instead something much more reckless and what one might call suicidal. He wasn’t sure if Graves thought himself ingenious or if he really was on an imminent collision course with the rock bottom that he’d been courting for the past few years but either way, he was not going to rejoice in his little victory for long at all if Gellert had his way. No, this had been a challenge from the American and Gellert would be damned if he left it unanswered.

But that could wait, for now: his focus was on the lovely but surprisingly treacherous boy currently burrowed under the chequered duvet before him. He couldn’t risk having too much fun with him tonight, not the kind of fun that he indulged himself in when Newt was at his house... No, unfortunately, Newt’s zoological housemates had proven to be too much of an obstacle for that. Whilst they had become grudgingly accepting of his presence in their home, both the fox and one of the birds – the one Newt had referred to as Lisbet – made a fuss whenever he tried to touch their owner in his slumbering hours. He would have ignored them but the racket the bird made often proved enough to wake Newt and Gellert had already received a few irritating though inconsequential scratches from the fox that whilst easy to explain away to the zoologist when he woke, proved more troublesome whenever those keen eyes - that no two people could agree on the colour of and that Gellert could see when he closed his own - looked between the fox and the psychiatrist.

Harming the boy’s creatures would get him nowhere and Gellert had already made sure to have Grimmson punished further for having broken that parameter when he’d killed the cat. An unfortunate accident ready to befall Grimmson in prison; not fatal, but one to send a message. A slip in the shower that would leave him much worse for wear for quite some time. Paralysis from the waist down could do that to a man after all. Gellert did not mind seeing his boy suffer, no, not at all, but when it was something so callous from the hands of a common loan shark and ex bounty hunter who thought himself above Grindelwald’s rules…well, that was another matter entirely. One that had been rectified and would not be repeated.

But as he slipped back onto the bed beside Newt, he didn’t see any harm in exploring just a little. The fox sat on the edge of the bed, watching but more at ease than she had been with him in past visits; he suspected that the titbits of high-quality meat he’d been feeding her each time he visited had finally been enough to lull her into the more docile behaviour. Even if she still watched him like a hawk. There was a part of him that commended her protective instincts even if the larger part of him was more irritated by her interruptions. As it was, Gellert let his hands drift over Newt, pushing down the covers slightly to reveal more of the pale, freckled skin, his fingers counting out each small blemish – finally uncovered as he had deemed it time to remove the bandages at night at least so that the boy’s muscles would not become overly stiff and damaged from the tight, supportive bindings.

He knew that the boy had dutifully been taking the pain medication that had been prescribed to him but he was sure that Newt was unaware of the careful alterations that Gellert had made to the capsules. He had used the lapses of awareness as they had left the hospital to add his own cocktail of drugs to the medication and as Newt was still taking them, the doctor felt assured that he was unaware that the temporary blackouts and sleepwalking had been at least partially caused by the pills. Newt trusted him, and it was a beautiful thing to behold, to consider, as he trailed surreptitious fingers along the smooth column of Newt’s throat and painted invisible, intricate patterns over the boy’s skin wherever his instincts led. Ones that might one day be carved in a more permanent way should the whim strike him. There was something to be said for preserving the mostly unmarred canvas before him, one that would eventually heal and become pale and unblemished once more, but the thought of leaving his marks permanently and inescapably on Newt proved just as tempting. He liked to leave a mark on those he encountered, even if it wasn’t always physical. 

Gellert’s index finger dipped into Newt’s bellybutton, tracing around it over to his hipbone and lingering there, just above the waistline of his boxers and the soft cock within them. He’d had his fair share of exploration with Newt’s slender, bewitching physique both with the younger man aware and unaware but there was something more intoxicating about the latter kind; not that he didn’t like seeing the boy’s conscious reactions, mind you, but there was something so uninhibited about feeling Newt shudder or gasp or sigh under his attention without the wherewithal to temper his reactions. It felt more like honesty than what Newt tempered himself to in his waking moments. He let his fingers drift below the elastic waistband and idly stroked soft fingers over the base of the young man’s cock, not stimulating, just feeling it out and revelling in the soft little sigh that Newt released as Gellert’s blunt nails scraped a little at his inner thigh. 

There was a part of him that knew that Newt’s…erratic behaviour of late could be put down to the medication tampering but only to a mild extent. No, Gellert was experimenting with more than simply the pharmaceutical methods of persuasion. For instance, the subtle little impulses he’d been threading here and there – the associations and neuroticism that could easily be blamed on trauma from recent events. The psychological impact of the death and tragedy surrounding him masking the changes to an explainable degree. It was a fine balance and one that Gellert was enjoying maintaining, subtle tuning and alterations that added more beauty to the work before him. It was all just so invigorating.

Newt broke the pattern of some nights in a row as when he stirred under Gellert’s touch – not an uncommon occurrence at all what with the night terrors he often suffered from - but this time he woke. Gellert deemed it too risky to mix more drugs with the cocktail Newt was already ingesting _and_ copious amounts of alcohol so when the zoologist’s eyes flickered open, he merely offered him a weary, easy-seeming smile.

“Y’kay?” Newt mumbled before some cognition seemed to infiltrate his rousing mind and he straightened a little, one hand going to massage his own shoulder reflexively, the contrition entering his countenance and his eyes slid momentarily closed before he opened them and sighed, “Stupid…of course you’re not, sorry.”

“I am content, Newt, no need to worry yourself,”

“Despite my usual policy on the matter… I rather think that’s about all I’m doing right now,” Newt muttered, eyes fixed on the bedclothes and fingers dropping to worry the duvet distractedly. “I did something awful and you’re being far too good about it…is this your way of punishing me? Because if so, I think I might rather prefer anger, perhaps a good deal of yelling. Just maybe not near my creatures if you don’t mind, I’d rather not upset them.”

Gellert arched one sculpted brow, impressed that the young man was not far off the mark at all but shook his head instead, “No, Newt. I have simply seen enough instances such as this to know that heated arguments and holding blame against one party is not the healthy way of reconciling matters and that it only results in heartbreak and pain. I see no issue with moving past this as long as it does not happen again.”

“It won’t,” Newt promised. Quickly but not so quickly that it had Gellert overly doubting the student’s conviction. “But I rather feel as if I’m more in your debt than ever,” his lashes lowered, fingers working a loose thread now, almost spasmodically in the jerkiness of the movements, the old duvet drawing around the thread and becoming rattier than ever as a result. “I don’t think that this is how relationships are meant to feel.”

“No two relationships are ever the same, Newt. The uniqueness of the individual influences the nature of the relationship and the circumstances under which it is forged give it its own particular flavour,” he brushed a hand through Newt’s hair, repressing a slight grimace at the lingering traces of product left in it as he smiled at the zoologist once more, “And I have told you before that you have no reason to feel beholden to me.”

“This is different; I did something that I would never usually have done because I grew too impatient and foolish to wait for you to come around to it in your own time. That’s not very like me at all, really. I’m not sure if I like being this sort of person even if you’re not holding it against me. Maybe especially because of that. It doesn’t seem right at all.”

Gellert shifted so that he was propped against the headboard of Newt’s bed and the zoologist moved with him, his arm coming to lay across Gellert’s midriff in response to the one the doctor had wrapped around Newt’s battered shoulders more firmly than his injuries might prefer. If it hurt him a great deal, Newt gave no sign of it apart from an increased tightness around his eyes and mouth. Gellert had to tread carefully here, around the boy’s startling pinpoints of insight that always managed to surprise Gellert just that little bit. Enough to challenge him to adapt.

“Perhaps you should consider the possibility that it was something about Graves, not just the differences occurring within yourself, that drew you to do what you did. Think of the experience he has had with enticing younger men into doing what he wants. Your friend came back to him repeatedly even after having been hurt in past. Now was that something that Jared would usually have done?”

Newt shook his head, looking perturbed, “No, Graves was a rather substantial exception to Jared’s ‘no attachments’ policy, he generally prefers flings as opposed to boyfriends…I guess I just supposed that Graves gave him a reason to think otherwise.”

“Precisely. Does this not give you the impression that perhaps the blame in this is not solely with yourself but with someone who seems content leading others on and being intelligent enough to get away with it?”

“But I-…it…he seemed…genuine,” Newt sounded unsure and Gellert gently rubbed the boy’s arm in a consoling manner.

“That’s likely exactly what he had your friend thinking, too.”

Newt stirred under the covers and stood, going over to the bathroom door in nought but his boxers and t-shirt, clutching the doorframe with one hand as he looked back, a little balefully, at Gellert. “I’m just going to clean up a bit. I’d rather you didn’t stay awake on my account.”

The bathroom door closed behind him and not long after, Gellert heard the shower running and smiled to himself, stretching out on the bed a bit more, inhaling the scent of Newt’s potent anxiety in favour of the scents of hot steam and minty shower-gel coming from the bathroom or the Animalia scents coming from everywhere else. It had gone better than expected but then again, Graves had dug his own namesake by having messed around with the irritating and rude Texan friend that Newt seemed so keen on. Things should proceed without too much trouble from here on in, at least in terms of Graves’ involvement anyway. The man was far too self-destructive to pose much of a threat, especially now that Newt had been made aware of his follies.

Gellert need not concern himself past the comforting thought that both Newt and Graves would be punished for their lecherous treachery and that he could bask in it without the blame falling upon him for quite some time. If at all.

The age-old axiom of ‘where there’s smoke…’ fit with pleasing ease and Gellert revelled in it.

* * *

Graves awoke the next morning in his Travelodge bedroom with a pounding head and a distinct sense of foreboding looming over him. It may have had something to do with the events of the previous night and how much he drank after Newt left but it might also have had something to do with the corpse of a young man grotesquely displayed at the foot of his bed. Despite having an alarming amount of experience with seeing such things, he doubted anyone would not have kicked themself back on the bed and halfway off it with a decidedly unmanly shout escaping dry lips. He stared in utter horror and dawning panic at the bloody, beaten, dismembered boy – who couldn’t have been older than twenty-five – and couldn’t close his eyes. Couldn’t tear them away for even an instant.

The boy was dark-haired and skinned with an ever so slight auburn tint to his afroed hair with wide, blank brown eyes that seemed frozen in the terror and realisation of his final moments. There was blood everywhere. Soaking into the off-white carpet, splashing the walls and smearing the surfaces right up until the foot of the bed. None of which, Graves was sure, had been there when he came back around 3am. He looked down at himself and saw that his bare feet were covered in gore. Dried-dark crimson and painting yet more incriminating smudges on the tastelessly white carpet. The scent of gasoline burning his nostrils too as he noticed the stains marring the carpet surrounding where he’d dropped his leather jacket, not much, but enough so that the pungent smell was tangible in the stale room air. 

“Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck…” he muttered, combing his hands back through his hair and taking some much-needed deep breaths before he let his mind drift into that place where he detached himself from the situation and instead looked at it objectively. Like he would have with a case once upon a time.

It was Grindelwald’s work. It had to be. It was just his sort of victim even if the MO wasn’t in his usual ballpark. Clearly, he wanted it to look like Graves was the one responsible and knowing that it was unlikely he had much time, he hurried to strip off his bloodied boxers and sprinted to the shower in record time, turning the heat up as high as it would go and began to scrub every last inch of his skin, taking care to scour under his nails, toes, scalp and every other area of his body that might be likely to collect or preserve planted evidence. He’d made mistakes before and he was determined to learn from then now, not stopping with the scalding water or soap until the water ran cold. 

The realisation that this was most likely a retaliation from his actions the night before struck him as he towelled off and dressed, checking every item of clothing for any obvious signs of tampering or contamination and coming up blank. Not that it didn’t mean there wasn’t planted evidence there, of course, but that could be remedied by buying new clothes once he was out of here. Graves knew better than to touch or try to move the body. With the amount of blood and gore staining and splattering the room and the characteristic meticulousness that Grindelwald had, he knew that any attempts to remove the body would not help him. All he could do now was get the hell out of here and lament the tragic loss of some poor bastard’s life in his own time. It might seem heartless but panicking now would do no one any good.

He shook out and checked over his few belongings with speedy precision as he packed them away, cast one last look at the unfortunate soul on the floor, crossed himself out of a habit he’d never quite managed to shake and left. The room was booked for another two weeks so it was unlikely that anyone would come knocking until the body started to smell. But he wasn’t going to let it wait that long, no, instead he dug his phone out as he left at a purposefully normal pace, smiling absently to the receptionist as he did so. Once outside, he dialled a number that he hadn’t called in years and prayed that it was still valid, feeling relief shoot through him as the phone both rang and was picked up reasonably promptly.

“Who is this?” came the short greeting.

“Scamander! Thank Christ,” he breathed into the phone before saying, “I need your help.”

“Graves? What’s going on?”

“I’d rather not explain this on the phone, can you meet me somewhere? In private. Preferably soon.”

There was a sigh and the sound of jangling keys on the other side of the line. “Alright, meet me at the north-east corner of Iveagh Gardens in an hour and for the love of God, bring coffee.”

The line went dead and it was only then that Graves noted that it was barely 8am on a Saturday. He shook his head and started walking at a brisk pace, long dark coat – a spare - pulled tight around his body to ward off the chill air and his bag thumping against one leg as he walked. The journey wasn’t long enough to warrant his Harley and trying to park it in the city centre was a nightmare even this early. He got there with a few minutes to spare so obliged the elder Scamander by grabbing them both large takeaway cups of coffee, waiting impatiently for the man to arrive.

When he did, he was dressed in a white shirt, no tie, grey suit trousers and coat and his hair looked remarkably more like his junior sibling’s when he wasn’t scraping and smoothing the living daylights out of it. The thought of Newt triggered an uncomfortable, guilty squirm in his stomach, anger in his blood and also a degree of sad fondness that had his fingertips tingling oddly. Or it might well have been the cold. Probably the cold. Shock too, no doubt. He pushed past the thoughts forcibly, however, as he had somewhat more pressing matters on his plate and an awful lot of convincing to do if the weary, irritated look on Theseus’ face was any reliable gauge.

“I’m here, Graves, now mind telling me why?”

Graves wisely handed over the coffee before speaking and guided them down quieter streets into a back-alley, sipping his own drink and flexing his hand on the strap of his bag. When he stopped and looked to Theseus, he made sure that his expression was open and blunt as he only had one shot at getting this right. “I woke up this morning to find one of the White Spider's victims in my hotel room.”

“ _What?”_ Theseus hissed, his grip on the coffee cup suddenly no match for the flimsy plastic and cardboard and he swore lowly as scalding hot coffee spilt over his hand.

Graves frowned at him. “Exactly as I said, Scamander. I came into the room around 3am with no dead bodies in sight and when I woke up about two hours ago, there was a young man dismembered at the foot of my bed. There was blood everywhere. He wasn’t murdered – he was _butchered_.”

“I can’t-...did you-...is it still there? The body?”

“Yes, I cleaned myself up and got out of there. Didn’t touch the body and didn’t disturb the crime scene more than I could help.”

“Smart, I guess,” Theseus acknowledged grudgingly before sighing. “But _Jesus,_ Graves, did you not think of calling this in?”

“I'm telling you, aren’t I?” Graves snapped before exhaling a slightly tremoring breath before continuing, “Look, Scamander, you know what the Spider is capable of and I’m fairly certain that there’s going to be something in that hotel room that incriminates me enough so that any sane thinking cop or judge will lock me up,” he spoke through gritted teeth now as the smile carved into his gut gave an aching grimace in reminder. “I’ve been there, done that, and I’d have the t-shirt to prove it if all the other people the Spider’s screwed over weren’t dead.”

Theseus nodded slowly, looking as if he were working on chewing off his own tongue as that vein in his forehead strained against pale skin, brain whirring underneath it all. “I get it, Graves, I do. You want someone in your corner but as it stands...we have no proof this wasn’t you. You fled the crime scene and came to a contact in the force with influence and that won’t look good to most people; just like you’re smart enough to play people into doing what you want.”

Graves felt like his teeth were going to crack under the pressure he was putting them under as he spoke, “Scamander, you _know_ me, at least well enough to know that I would never do something like this. But more importantly, you know what Grindelwald is capable of and I happen to know he’s both in the city and that I recently royally pissed him off.”

“And you’re only telling me this now?” came the incredulous hiss.

Graves winced as he lowered his voice further, stepping closer before admitting, “He’s set his sights on your brother and has got Newt all twisted up thinking that he cares about him. I tried warning him off but the bastard made it pretty clear that Newt would _not_ benefit from it.”

“What the hell do you mean? Twisted up how? What has he done?”

Graves exhaled a frustrated, uneasy breath “He’s got his claws in Newt – courting him in his own demented way and arranging for things to happen that only make Newt like him more. Remember when Newt told you I was at Grindelwald’s house? I went there because I’d seen them together at a restaurant uptown and I wasn’t about to let Newt become another statistic so I went in there and managed to throw off Grindelwald’s plans for the evening enough so that Newt left but I haven’t exactly had the opportunity to do that every time they decide to spend some alone time together.” He was trembling a little now with pent up frustration and revulsion as he confessed “And then last night, I managed to piss him off and I’m pretty damn certain this is his way of punishing me for it.”

It was safe to say that the remains of Theseus’ coffee did not survive being thrown at the alley wall. Graves winced as the expected question came from the Brit's lips, “What did you do?”

Graves braced himself both mentally and physically as he took a half-step back in readiness for the oncoming onslaught, “I sort of hooked up with Newt last night.”

Theseus’ face went completely blank for perhaps three whole seconds before he nodded once, ducked his head and then slugged Graves hard across the face.

Yeah, he probably deserved that.

He rubbed his aching jaw, working it a bit and brushing probing fingers briefly over the stinging skin, “I didn’t _plan_ for any of this to happen and I think that your brother being under the influence of a sadistic, cannibalistic sociopath is more the cause for concern here.”

“And you thought that the best way to solve that problem was to get in Newt’s pants? What the hell is wrong with you?!”

Graves didn’t answer, merely shook his head mutely and Theseus was silent for a long few moments, seeming to deflate almost from the potent rage before he asked in a quiet, shamed voice, “Did he say why? Grindelwald? I thought that-…I thought that when I backed off, he’d leave my family alone, and he did.” His expression crumpled, “I never thought that Newt-…not after so long, there’s _got_ to be another reason. It _can’t_ just be because-” he breathed to a shuddering stop, looking at Graves with wide, beseeching, furious eyes and the detective wished he could tell the Brit something that would comfort him. But lying wouldn’t get them anywhere.

“But you didn’t back off, did you? Even if you thought you were being subtle about it, he always knows when someone is looking into his business. It’s how he’s survived this long.”

Theseus nodded vaguely, “It wasn’t all that much, really, I was just trying to keep tabs on him, to dig into his history a little bit, just in case he eventually did slip up somehow and that I could-” he sighed deeply, massaging his forehead before looking back to Graves with stern, determined eyes. “I suppose it doesn’t matter now anyway but you’ve got to tell me everything you know, Graves, we have to trust each other and if I think you’re holding back on me that’s going to make it a damn sight harder to do.”

Graves sighed. “Alright, but trust me when I tell you that you’re not going to like any of what I have to say. And I’m going to ask you to refrain from hitting me again until I’ve finished.”

“No promises,” Theseus replied but looked at him with expectant eyes all the same as Graves launched into the story.

* * *

“So let me get this straight…” Theseus began slowly and he saw how Graves seemed to cringe at the mere opening, “You’ve been hunting Grindelwald for years now and have been essentially stalking my little brother for near a fortnight and you never once came over what could possibly be one of the most important links between the two?”

Graves frowned, looking confused, “I mean, I didn’t realise you were related until I saw you together but I’m not sure what that has to do with-”

Theseus cut him off impatiently, “Not me, moron. I mean Dumbledore.”

“Who?”

“Professor Albus Dumbledore. The chap who just so happens to have courted both Newt and Grindelwald.”

Graves’ dark eyes widened, “What?”

“Newt came to Dublin in the first place because of Dumbledore. I imagine they probably ended it because being involved with a professor at his university was a damn stupid idea. Despite all the effort he went to in an attempt to hide it, not even Newt is capable of hiding something like that from me for nearly a year. Especially not when he happened to be one of my professors just a couple years before.”

“Damn it,” Graves muttered, rubbing his dark brows with irritable fingers and nervous seeming energy. “And Grindelwald?”

“They were together for around eight years, I think; the details are understandably sketchy at best but I’m pretty sure that Dumbledore was involved in Grindelwald’s…culinary proclivities. I mean, they were together for a long time and hosted dinner parties in that time so I think he must have been. They were together from a fairly young age – about seventeen or so, if the information from Dumbledore’s aunt is correct, and they went their own ways in their mid-twenties. Don’t know what happened between them but considering Dumbledore’s still alive, I’m guessing it can’t have ended too badly.”

“I’m not sure that’s all there is to it,” Graves muttered before looking up sharply at Theseus, “And you only found this out in the years since we investigated him together?” Theseus nodded. “And you didn’t do anything about it?”

Theseus glared, “I told you, I wasn’t about to risk my wife or my son for this...it’s only now that Newt is involved that I’m taking this risk by talking to you about it. But that doesn’t mean that I’m going to get involved any further than I have to,” he sighed despondently. “I think it would be best if you laid low and bided your time until you’ve got a better plan to tackle this. Grindelwald isn’t going to take this well and unless he thinks he’s got you on the ropes, he’s going to keep coming at you or maybe do something to Newt to punish us both.”

Graves looked pained but nodded slowly, “As much as I hate to admit it…you’re right. If my suspicions are correct, Grindelwald’s already responsible for having Newt threatened, beaten, hunted and having his damn cat killed right in front of him. Not to mention the damn corpse he no doubt left for him to find near his house. I don’t think that whatever demented attachment Grindelwald feels for Newt has extended to not traumatising him.”

Thinking of his research, Theseus nodded, “What little I learned of Grindelwald and Dumbledore’s involvement, I don’t think his idea of affection even vaguely resembles sanity. More based on pain and murdering people together than anything else.”

“No shit,” Graves murmured, looking deeply concerned and despite the more pressing issues at hand, Theseus couldn’t help but put in.

“Now Graves, about what you did with Newt.”

“What of it?” the American looked suitably wary and his familial instincts felt a touch more appeased by that caution.

“Was this some idiotic attempt to get back at Grindelwald or get Newt away from him or was it something else?”

Graves looked surprised and somewhat conflicted and if it weren’t for the already forming bruise on his face, Theseus might’ve been tempted to thump him one again but ruled that Graves’ answer would be the deciding factor on that one. It was a little while before Graves ventured a response and when he did, he sounded about as uncertain as he looked. “Perhaps a bit of each,” Theseus’ fists clenched at his side and Graves quickly went to clarify before the Brit’s fist could fly. “Look, I like him, Scamander, I do, truly, but I couldn’t tell you one solid reason why I did what I did that won’t make you punch me again.”

“ _Try,_ ” Theseus bit out, eyes boring into his.

“What do you want me to say? Is there an answer here that will make you happy?” Graves snapped back, eyes almost as ardent as the other’s “Whether you like it or not, your brother is a consenting adult and I know that you’re not stupid enough to think that all things in life are as clear cut as you seem to want them to be. Please just try to be an adult about this and accept that it happened and that it’s not really your priority to be fixating on what I feel for Newt when his other current choice is Gellert goddamn Grindelwald.”

“Don’t think that I’m not going to have a _very long_ conversation with my brother about this but now isn’t really the time for that.”

“And yet you still think it’s time to be giving _me_ the third-degree about it?”

“Well, considering you’re going to be wanted for murder pretty soon and you’ve managed to piss off Grindelwald yet again, I feel like this might be my only chance.”

Graves gave him a look but nodded slowly all the same, “Alright, I don’t know what any of it meant but trust me when I tell you that my plan was not to seduce Newt away from Grindelwald like this. I wanted to get him to trust me enough so he would believe my warnings but may have let a lot of whiskey and what I wanted to get in the way of that last night…I’m sorry I endangered Newt further but I swear that it wasn’t my intention to hurt him or use him…not really.”

“Not really?” Theseus repeated sceptically and Graves shook his head slightly.

“Hurting him definitely wasn’t my intention but if it got him away from Grindelwald, then it wasn’t exactly something I was taking off the table,” Graves’ eyes averted, looking furtive and almost shamed but steely, nonetheless.

As much as he hated to admit it, Theseus knew that Graves was probably right – lesser of two evils and all that. Still, the fear for his family and the deep-seated terror of Grindelwald what he was capable of doing was admittedly more important right now – just as Graves had said. “I get your point, Graves, now if you’re quite finished, I think that we need to decide what to do with the fact that you have what is probably yet another student’s corpse in your hotel room.”

“I’m not about to try to explain my way out of this with the investigating officers as I usually would because I know how that will go. They didn’t believe me before and I doubt anyone except you will believe me now.” He looked haunted, hunted all of a sudden and Theseus could only imagine the pain of having friends and colleagues believing that you were capable of something like what Grindelwald was capable of. Graves was probably right in thinking that the local law enforcement wouldn’t believe him innocent when even his own department back in New York had not years before. Being accused of similar crimes now and having evidence all over his hotel room would look bad. 

Theseus knew that Graves had once been as much of a stickler for the rules and regulations as he was but circumstances such as these changed things. The reality of the current situation was that even if Graves cooperated with the police and told them everything, with no proof, Graves would be considered unstable or lying and imprisoned for the foreseeable future. Just as Grindelwald intended. If Theseus helped him dispose of the body and the evidence, some poor boy was going to become yet another unsolved murder statistic and his family and friends would never gain closure. Or worse, they would be discovered and both imprisoned. The options looked bleak in the extreme.

Depressingly enough, letting Graves simply disappear seemed like the best option right now. There were too few people around who were capable of even potentially taking Grindelwald down and that knew what could happen if they didn’t. It occurred to him then and his eyes snapped up to Graves who seemed to catch onto the dawning idea in Theseus’ eyes.

“What? What is it?”

“Dumbledore.”

“What?”

“Dumbledore, I mean, he knows Grindelwald better than anyone, I’d wager, and he cared for Newt once upon a time too. Maybe, if he still does…maybe he could do something to help.”

Graves was looking at him as though he was utterly bonkers and when he spoke, it was slow and dubious sounding. “Scamander…you do realise you’re talking about a man who knowingly spent years of his life with a cannibalistic serial killer and potentially even helped him do it,” he exhaled an incredulous sound and his voice rose to a near-shout, “Hell, if Grindelwald let him go about living his life, maybe Dumbledore was his partner in crime. Maybe he’s killing people entirely of his own volition. We have no way of knowing _anything_!” 

Theseus sighed. “I know…look, I know it’s certainly not ideal but unless you’ve got a better plan while you’re going into hiding, I think this may be our best shot.”

Graves did not look happy but nodded slowly, “I feel like I’m going to regret asking this, Scamander, but do you have any way of contacting this guy that doesn’t involve going through police records because I don’t think that it will go unnoticed if you go through the usual routes.”

“I think I might. I don’t think you’re going to like it because I sure as hell don’t.”


	15. I'm the touch you crave

**Chapter 15: I'm the touch you crave, I'm the plans that you made,**

**But fuck all your plans, I'm bored**

**3 rd – 4th November **

Monday dawned surprisingly bright and sunny, his early classes proving less of a chore to walk to even with the ever-present aches of his healing injuries and he found that each breath of cool, clear air served to reinvigorate him and focus his busy mind. The lectures went smoothly despite his sporadic note taking and attendance of late as he was more than ahead on both the course material and practical knowledge. Jared was conspicuously absent but that honestly wasn’t anything that odd for the Texan and his lecturer merely told Newt wearily to pass the classwork on and warn Jared yet again about his attendance and that it didn’t matter how high his test scores were if he skipped most of the lectures.

It was around 1pm and after having solid class hours, he decided to spend some time at a coffee shop, get some food and make use of the Wi-Fi. He’d been off work for a little while now and didn’t fancy running into his boss, a notoriously irritable and unreasonable man who wasn’t unknown to demand on the spot shifts from any employees who dared spend their free time at the shop. And he definitely did not want to go back to Temple Coffee, so he went to a smaller place just down the road from it.

It was as he was juggling a pastry, coins and a coffee cup at the front of the queue that his phone started ringing and he ended up in a mad scramble to pay and cram himself onto the end of one of the high tables by the front window, dropping his bag with a wince and clicking answer before pressing the phone between his ear and shoulder whilst he dug out his study materials. “Hello?”

“Hey Newt, it's me.”

His brows furrowed, his pen slipping habitually between his teeth as he extracted his notebook and his muttered reply of “Thee?” must’ve communicated something to his brother as the elder’s voice sounded sort of tense when he spoke again.

“You busy?”

“Kinda,” Newt said, retrieving his pen from beneath his teeth and dropping it onto his notebook so he could properly hold his phone. “No, not really, why, is there something you wanted to talk about?” “No, not really, why, is there something you wanted to talk about?”

“I’m near the university and have some spare time on my hands if you want to try catching up again?”

Newt bit his lip but shook his head, blowing curls away from his eyes as he did so, “Sure, I’m at Ya Zhou’s near the campus.” at Ya Zhou’s near the campus.”

“Be there in ten,” came the quick response before Theseus hung up and Newt stared at his phone for several seconds before mentally shrugging it off and keeping an eye on the street for his brother’s arrival. It was only as he caught sight of his reflection that he remembered that Theseus was not yet aware of his injuries and cursed himself for diving head-first into the proverbial hot water. The most noticeable blemish was going to be the cut to his lip and subtler bruising around the area even if it had now faded to red rather than the vibrant purple and green tones it had been before. There wasn’t anything he could do about it now though, save from asking to borrow makeup from someone to cover it but that wasn’t exactly something he was about to do in the middle of a semi-crowded coffee shop…or ever, really. Horse Lords, where was Queenie when he needed her?

He was too busy staring off out of the window when he heard the doorbell jingle and the next thing he knew, there was a hand on his shoulder. Newt turned too quickly and nearly went off his stool as he saw Theseus, looking at him with a mildly amused but mostly worried expression. Theseus pulled him in for a too-tight hug that seemed to squeeze the air out of him and he made a pained sound as his back flared in agony, causing the detective to release him and hold him at arm’s length by his elbows in a thoroughly odd motion.

“Hey, you alright?”

Newt smiled tightly, “Fine, sorry, just drifted off a bit there.” 

Theseus jabbed a thumb over his own shoulder, releasing Newt’s shoulder as did so, hands digging into his pockets for money, “I’m just going to go get a drink and then we can move this outside. I fancy a bit of a walk if that’s alright?”

“Righto,” Newt fumbled to start collecting his stuff back up again, packing it away in his satchel as Theseus got his drink. He supposed the studying would have to wait. Again. They left a few minutes later and began walking through the streets in the vague direction of Newt’s place but in no hurry as they took the longer, more scenic routes to prolong the conversation. It was general stuff really, filling Newt in on what was happening back in London with Tina and Edwin and that sort of thing.

“Mum sent a postcard last week, she’s in Rome apparently, gradually gravitating homeward country by country,” Theseus commented, tone as bitter as it ever was when talking about their mother and Newt already knew about it from the occasional emails his mum sent him with links or news she thought he might find interesting as a fellow zoologist.

Newt nodded along, listening but mostly trying to keep on Theseus’ right side so that his face was at least partially obscured by his hair and the angles they were walking at. He wasn’t entirely sure if he’d been successful so far and was proved correct when Theseus touched his arm carefully, bringing Newt to a stop beside as they stood between a high chain-link fence and a carpark.

“Newt.”

“What?”

“Are you going to tell me what happened or are you just going to skulk the whole way back?”

Newt sighed and angled his head back up to look at his brother, albeit with as much furtiveness as he habitually would and replied, “I’m not _skulking_.”

“No,” Theseus agreed mildly “Hunching would be a more accurate description I reckon but I digress. What happened to your face, Newt?”

“An accident,” Newt brushed off with a twitch of a half-smile at his sceptical brother, “Made the mistake of forgetting how much force a skittish fox can put behind her paws when she wants to.”, “Made the mistake of forgetting how much force a skittish fox can put behind her paws when she wants to.”

Theseus’ brows furrowed, “You have a fox living with you?”

“Oh, no, of course not,” Newt hastened half-heartedly, sensing a lecture coming and Theseus rolled his eyes before quite deliberately ignoring that and pressing.

“And I suppose you’re going to try to tell me that a fox was responsible for doing your back in too?”

“It’s not ‘done in’, exactly, and no, I had a fall in the park - around the time that I found that body, oddly enough,” he felt a little guilty bringing that up but it seemed to assuage his brother’s concern for just a moment. 

“Alright, alright, I know you’ve had a tough time of it at the moment but that doesn’t mean that you’ve got to try to hide anything from me,” Theseus told him and Newt nodded, not saying anything but understanding what he was trying to say and the sentiment behind it. This seemed to irritate Theseus, however, as his frown deepened and though they began walking again, the pace was faster now, almost angry: with an intent. Though what that was, Newt honestly couldn’t say but he was struggling a little to keep up with his aching body complaining at each quickened step.

It was an odd role-reversal as Newt – being the more long-legged and active brother – usually had to slow his pace to accommodate Theseus. He’d had a shameful amount of fun teasing Theseus earlier on in his life of parenthood and domesticity as his once athletic policeman’s physique had taken on what Tina fondly referred to as ‘padding for extra cuddles’. Or at least that was what she called it when Edwin asked why Theseus was refusing cake at his sixth birthday party. Newt had snorted into his plastic cup of squash at the time and received no end of glares from his brother because of it.

Now, however, Theseus did not seem to notice him struggling to keep up, that was until the zoologist spoke up. “Theseus,” Newt hedged and the elder sibling turned his head at the younger’s tone, eyes coming close to meeting his but as usual, not quite meeting the mark. “There’s nothing for you to be worried about, you know; not with me, at least and just because I’m not telling you everything that’s going on in my life doesn’t mean that I’m lying or that I don’t trust you. It just means that either I know I can handle whatever it is without your input or that it isn’t worth mentioning in the first place.” 

Theseus slowed his pace a bit and seemed to consider his words as carefully as Newt had. “Newt, not trying to be harsh here but your judgement on what’s ‘worth mentioning’ isn’t really worth jack-squat half the time. I don’t think I could count the number of times where you’ve hidden things from me and I’ve found out about them far too late to be of any help or comfort. You may well be able to deal with them on your own but that doesn’t mean you should have to.”

“Not even when they’re things you could do very little about? You’re a MET detective, Thee, not superman, despite your hopes otherwise”, Theseus opened his mouth, clearly ready to protest but Newt barrelled on regardless, eyes fixed on his sibling's shoulder as he spoke in a fervent, earnest tone, “And yes, I know I have people in my life who I can go to but I rather think there comes a point where I sort these things for myself and I’ve been doing things my way for about as long as I can remember. I don’t want that to change. I don’t want to burden people more than I have to and I’m fairly certain that you have far more on your plate to worry about than me.” He smiled a strained, encouraging smile, “You have a son, Theseus, and Tina and an important job and I don’t think that my problems – whatever their size – should distract you from any of that.”

“I’m perfectly capable of taking care of my family, Newt. _All_ of my family,” there was something in Theseus’ tone that made Newt turn, to stop and properly face him for the first time that day, eyes boring into one another’s.

“What’s got you all riled up like this? And don’t bother trying to tell me that you’re just looking out for me in a general sense because I know what that looks like on you and this most certainly isn’t it,” he gestured widely to Theseus' tense face and form, “ _This_ is you being worried about something and not trusting me enough to tell me what it is that’s bothering you. That you think I’ll get in the way if you tell me about it and we both know that never really works out well for anyone.”

“No, Newt, that’s not it. It’s not that I don’t trust you, it’s-" he exhaled sharply “-it’s more complicated than that.”

“Please, enlighten me, then,” Newt’s tone was almost icy, challenging, and it worked as Theseus responded with anger and anger made him talk but even then, Newt could see that whatever it was was difficult as he seemed to chew on his tongue momentarily before he spoke in a steely tone.

“I have reason to believe that you’re being targeted by the serial killer in the city.”

Newt stared. “What do you mean by targeted exactly? Because of Theo Peverell? Because I was the one to find his body?” 

“That, and Credence Barebone,” Theseus confirmed and when Newt looked at him, somewhat askance, he clarified, “I listened in on the interview. I wasn’t allowed to participate obviously because of familial bias, jurisdiction and all that but I still know that you knew Credence; more so than you let on to Kama.” 

Newt felt a cold tendril of something curl in his stomach, like dread or apprehension but subtler and more worrisome, “What makes you think that?” What makes you think that?”

Theseus sighed, a long-suffering sound, “I know about Dumbledore. I found out later than I would have liked but I know.”

And there it was, that feeling growing and festering, he felt a shudder run through him and his eyes averted to the pavement once more. “Oh…”

“Yes, _‘oh’_. I left you to deal with that on your own and look at you! Years on and you can’t even hear his name without flinching.”

“Oh and telling you about it would have made everything magically better, would it?” Newt bit back and Theseus shook his head a fraction. 

“No, I suppose not, but the more important thing here is that it’s – at least in part – to do with Dumbledore.”

“What? How?”

Theseus paused, “We have reason to believe that the killer was…involved with Dumbledore in his youth and that he’s now out to get back at him.”

“What…” Newt breathed, eyes wide and that feeling gradually worming its way up his throat.

“You see now why I’m concerned?” Theseus asked, one hand coming up to brace itself on Newt’s arm, pushing lightly against it as he regarded him with worried eyes.

“Just a smidge…” Newt breathed before his eyes narrowed, “Hang on, what did you mean by ‘we’?”

“We, as in…the department,” Theseus tried and when Newt narrowed his eyes at him, he sighed slightly and relented, “Alright, I started working with an ex-detective who has a great deal of experience with the White Spider. He’s been tracking him for quite a few years now.”

“The White-...what?” Newt couldn’t quite finish the question and instead took a deep breath, running a hand through his hair and wincing as the ever-present pain in his shoulder flared at the movement. “No, what I want to know is why on earth you think that Albus would have been involved with a serial killer? Or why that would bring me into any of it now. We broke up years ago.”

“It's not just to do with him. It’s also to do with me. I’ve investigated him before and I get the feeling that it's happening now, that he’s coming after _you_ now because of the other detective. He hasn’t stopped looking for him and I imagine that even the Spider has limits to how long he’ll let someone stalk him before he wants them to stop. This detective is not the sort of guy who’s going to give up because of a threat to his own life, thus enter you; innocent bystander caught in the middle of it all,” He sighed deeply “He’s not going to risk you getting hurt if he knows what’s good for him but I get the feeling its already too late for that given his recent actions.” 

“And by ‘he’, you mean Graves?”

“How did you know I meant-”

Newt offered his brother a droll smile, “It wasn’t that hard to figure out. I’ll admit I’m surprised that he’s no longer on active duty and that he’s lied about it but from what he told me of his international manhunt coupled with him half-stalking me and then with what you just told me, it all adds up rather easily,” he raised an eyebrow, “Especially when you’ve always had a rubbish poker face.” 

“Damn it…” Theseus murmured, rubbing his eyes with a thumb and forefinger before they began walking again.

“What did Graves manage to do all of a sudden that infuriated the serial killer he’s spent years pursuing? Why’s he lashing out now?”

“Well you’ve met the man; it’s not hard to imagine that he’s rankled just about everyone he’s ever met. And from what we know of the Spider, he’s not a fan of rudeness, or Americans either for that matter,” Theseus half-ranted, clearly skirting something before he muttered bitterly. “Can’t say that I am at the moment either…” 

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing at all,” came the stilted reply.

“ _Thee_ ,” Newt pressed and his brother sighed.

“You slept with him.”

Newt tripped over the curb and into a nearby post about as quickly as his brain did a reboot. “No, I most certainly did not!” He half-squawked before pressing his eyes closed and amending, “Well…not technically.” 

“Bloody hell, Newt! Can you try dating someone who isn’t both drastically older than you and wildly inappropriate?”

“We are definitely not _dating._ We were barely involved at all really and I won’t be seeing him again any time soon if I have any say in it,” he felt a twinge of something unpleasant saying those words aloud but pushed past it. 

“Right, whatever, I don’t really care,” Theseus muttered, looking decidedly irritated.

“Of course you don’t, that’s why you brought it up,” he shot back patiently, simultaneously thinking of all the choice words he wished he could level at Graves right now for apparently having blabbed to his brother of all people. God knows why he would have ever thought _that_ was a good idea. There was a part of him then that wondered if Graves had only fooled around with him in the first place just to irritate his brother for whatever reason. Because if it was…well, Newt was fairly sure that Grimmson wasn’t the only one who was going to suddenly find himself in hot water because of past follies.

“Idiot,” came the customary response from Theseus. “Anyway, what I was trying to say is that I think it would be a good idea if you came back to London.”

Newt stared, jarred from his swirling thoughts by the announcement, “You can’t be serious.” “You can’t be serious.”

“Newt, this killer is in Dublin and he’s going to hurt you if you stay.”

“Who’s to say that he won’t follow me to London or wherever else I happened to go? If he’s as intent on me as you say? Surely it would make more sense to stay away from wherever Albus and you are so that I don’t present a more obvious target.”

Theseus looked infinitely frustrated as they paused, finally outside Newt’s building and stopped on the pavement, glaring at one another, “Or maybe you’d be safer because you’d be near people who care about you?”

“And I don’t have that here?” Newt was coming close to shouting now, pent-up infuriation infiltrating him more strongly than the horrible squirmy feeling. “I have friends and family and a relationship here, and I don’t see why I should abandon my life and education because of something that _might_ help with something you _suspect_.” 

“Your education isn’t worth a damn if you’re dead, Newt!”

“Even if I wanted to, I _can’t_ leave. Do you not remember that I was ordered not to leave the city, let alone the country, whilst Kama’s investigation is ongoing? An investigation that won’t end until this serial killer is caught.”

Evidently, Theseus hadn’t thought of that as he blanched, looking close to punching something before he hissed, “Of course you choose _now_ to start caring about the legality of your bloody actions.” to start caring about the legality of your bloody actions.”

Newt huffed a breath of bitter laughter before asking in a somewhat more diplomatic tone, “Could you not at least warn me who I’m meant to be looking out for?” 

Theseus looked like he wanted to argue but instead, his mouth snapped shut momentarily before he sighed. “It wouldn’t be safe to do that, Newt because if you know then I doubt you’re going to be able to hide it.”

“Why should that matter?”

“Because once you know and he _knows_ you know, you’re just going to get hurt or worse and I won’t necessarily be around in time to stop it.”

“Well, you’re saying that I might get hurt anyway so why not just tell me?”

“Because he’s the sort of killer who bides his time and if provoked, he’s not going to back down. As long as he thinks you’re oblivious he might well just leave off on doing anything really bad so we have more time to catch him.”

“That’s tenuous logic at best, Thee, and you know it.”

Something in Theseus’ restrained countenance snapped and his voice was a strained shout as he stepped uncomfortably close to Newt, using his slightly stockier frame to loom over his junior sibling in a way he’d never done before, “No, it’s not! It’s the kind of logic that decides whether you’re maimed, murdered and strung up in a park whilst the bastard eats the rest of you at some demented idea of a dinner party!”

Newt turned on his heel, pulling on the strap of his bag irritably as he searched through it for his keys which had chosen a great time to bury themselves somewhere deep within the luggage. Seriously, how big could the inside of a bloody bag really be??

“Newt, look, I’m sorry but you’re just going to have to trust me on this. You’re not safe here and I’d feel much better about it all if you’d just come back home where we can keep an eye on you. It doesn’t even have to be permanent – just for a few months until we get this sorted out.”

Newt rounded on Theseus, found-key in hand and brandished at his brother almost like a weapon, “I don’t _have_ to do anything. I can’t afford to skip months’ worth of classes or work and abandon my life. And who’s to say that this will even only take months? You say that you and Graves have been hunting him for _years_ and you think that a few months is now magically going to make all the difference just because I go back to London? You’ve got to know how unlikely that sounds,” he turned and jammed the key in the lock, turning it and stepping inside but not fast enough to close the door on Theseus who caught the door and followed him doggedly downstairs to his floor. Newt stopped outside his flat door and fixed the elder with a hard stare. “You’re not coming in.”

“Can I at least use your loo?” he asked and Newt sighed before opening the door and stepping aside to let his sibling through, hearing the bathroom door close a second or so later but Newt purposefully did not move from his spot by the door, leaving it open with a hand on the frame. Theseus thankfully heeded the warning in the younger Scamander’s countenance as he went straight out again and paused on his way back towards the stairs, looking back at Newt with something odd in his eyes.

“Newt, don’t you understand that I’m just trying to help you here and that I’m much less likely to have a stress-related aneurysm if I’m not being separated from the rest of my family whilst trying to help you, you ridiculously stubborn bastard?”

That cut through Newt’s anger then and his eyes dropped to the floor by Theseus’ over-polished shoe. “I’m sorry, Thee, but I have a life here and I think you should get back to your own in London. Give Eddie and Tina my love, do normal family things and just stop worrying about me. If there’s really a killer after me, wouldn’t you rather he was away from your wife and son? Better me than them if it comes down to it. I promise I’ll be careful.”

“I really don’t know if that’s going to make a difference at this point, Newt,” Theseus murmured despondently before stepping forward and pulling him into a one-armed hug that lacked the usual shoulder clapping motion in clear care for the injured area, the other arm instead awkwardly patting the younger’s side. Newt shrugged it off as their usual, mutual awkwardness when it came to brotherly contact. When Theseus withdrew, he jammed his hands back in his pockets, eyes fixed on the door behind Newt before he sighed again.

“Just try not to make any rash decisions, will you? I mean with _anything_. I’m going to be sticking around for at least another week or so because of all this and if you ever feel like you need help or even if you’re just unsure about something, you’ve got to promise you won’t hesitate to come to me about it.”

“Alright,” Newt replied, stepping back and smiling a little as Helga came up behind him and began twining herself around and in between his legs, eying his brother with suspicious amber-green eyes and meowing authoritatively. She was probably hungry and he glanced back up to Theseus, feigning apology as he indicated the feline, “Sorry, got to take care of everyone. I’ll speak to you another time.”

“See that you do,” came the typically bossy response and Newt snorted softly before closing the door between them and depositing his bag on the coatrack and scooping up the squirming cat. the typically bossy response and Newt snorted softly before closing the door between them and depositing his bag on the coatrack and scooping up the squirming cat.

Newt took her over to the still half-full bowl of her food and pointedly plopping her down in front of it with a stern, “There’s food right there so stop fussing for more.” His eyes lingering on the slightly dusty, now-empty spot next to the remaining cat bowls before he put the kettle on and settled in to get some work done. It was dark by the time he slowed down in his frantic scribbling, page-turning and googling. His laptop having been stolen had been such an imposition that he’d had to order a replacement that thankfully had come under his contents insurance so he’d not had to waste too much money on it. He’d resorted to using his phone for quite a while but thankfully it was okay now, especially seeing as he seemed to have lost his phone in the depths of his bag as his keys had been.

He got up, stiff-bodied from the chair, took his medication and made dinner, doling out portions of food to everyone else too and prepared to settle in for the evening before his phone sounded from somewhere in his room. He ended up finding it stuffed in the sand-filled pocket of his jacket which was odd but he supposed he must've jammed in there by accident after answering Theseus’ call earlier. This time he made sure to check the caller ID and felt a nervous flutter in his chest as he saw it was Gellert. The doctor had other matters to deal with after leaving on Saturday and Newt had let the older man have his space, getting the feeling that it would probably be needed after what happened. This was the first time they’d spoken since and his voice was a touch hesitant as he answered. 

“How are you?” 

“Fine thank you, Newt, or as well as can be expected at least,”

Newt winced, his eyes scrunching closed as he pressed his phone into his forehead, the cool, slightly gritty feeling against his skin a trace of relief in the swamp of remorse “I’m sorry…”

A sigh on the other end, “No, that was not what I was referring to. I merely meant that I had to deal with a particularly difficult patient over the course of the weekend and that it proved rather wearing.”

He frowned, “I thought you didn’t see patients at the weekend?” 

“I don’t,” Gellert confirmed crisply. “I had a referral patient visit my office and I ended up having to escort them home.”

“Oh, is everything alright now?”

“Quite,” came the short response and Newt flopped onto his sofa, curling his knees up to his side and tapping out a nervous, irregular rhythm onto them with his free hand, unsure of how to continue.

“I suppose you had something in particular that you wanted to talk about?”

“I was going to invite you to lunch at my house tomorrow.”

Newt quickly scanned his timetable where it was pinned to his cracked wall and nodded to himself, “Yes, I’m free after twelve.”

“Perfect, can I expect you at 1pm?”

“Sure,” Newt was going to say more but was surprised when the line cut off abruptly and he was left staring blankly at the sandy screen for a few moments, taken aback by the uncustomarily rude exit. He was almost tempted to call back in case it had been a mistake of some kind but decided against it as he didn’t want to irritate Gellert further if it had been intentional. After all, he was perfectly justified to be a little snippy about now. It stung dully but he forcibly put it out of his mind as he curled up on the sofa with the remaining cats and Pickett who curled up on his shoulder and wrapped his tail about the zoologist’s neck in a loose, protective curl. 

The lizard seemed to have accepted his home-based role better than Newt might’ve expected and though he was still affectionate, he no longer pined as badly as he had before. “It’s not good to get too attached, you know. I’d be here all the time with you if I could but it wouldn’t be a very good idea. We’d all starve for one thing, and I don’t want to put any of you guys through that again.” Frederick rubbed his face into Newt’s stomach at the sound of his soft murmurs, his one good eye regarding him with a habitually feline haughtiness but the lack of claws latching into Newt gave the student nothing much to worry about on that front. On all others, however…well it was all a big bloody mess if he were honest.

Guilt gnawed at him, along with pain, apprehension and uncertainty. And above it all, Graves lingered on his thoughts like a morning mist that refused to ever quite burn away, stronger in the times when his mind began to wander. What happened between them still baffled him; both in why he’d acted upon his impulses like that in a way most unlike himself but also in why he couldn’t quite shake the memory of each branding touch the American had laid upon his skin. The feel of his lips, his big, strong hands, the way he seemed to know each and every sweet spot almost as well as Newt did himself. The thick, heavy, satisfying feeling of the detective’s length filling his mouth, pressing his tongue down and around. The more innocuous little sparks of contact like his lips and stubbled chin pressing to the back of his ear and neck. The fingers teasing his rim and the hand pressing over his mouth, stealing his voice and breath but settling him into it in a way that felt safe and sweetly dangerous at the same time. Controlled yet spontaneous. A perfect blend that had Newt’s cock stirring treacherously at the memory.

Gellert’s face flashed before his eyes then, intense and fierce but fervently amorous in that particular way of his that served to truly terrify and arouse at the same time. It was a strange thing but one that drew him in as inexplicably as it bound him to the sentiment as much as the man. The intrigue and the emotion. Different, oh so different from Albus or even Graves but just as scintillating as the arousal in the zoologist’s gut proved too difficult to ignore now and he stood with frustration, stripping off his trousers and lowering his boxers, flopping onto his bed, sliding his shirt up until he could caress the planes of his own chest. He let his imagination drift, not focussing on one particular person touching him as his fingers roved in familiar patterns but only because one made him feel longing, one guilt, and the last a miserable combination of both. 

It was a quick jerk off, a need more than anything, just to vent the stress and arousal in him for a few sweet moments of bliss where the endorphins melted his brain into a nice puddle of vague goo that didn’t have to think about all the horrible things that had happened. The things that had happened around him. To him. The things he’d done. He shuddered when he came, hips jerking and eyes tight closed as some sort of weird amalgamation of Graves and Gellert’s faces flashed behind his closed lids. A touch of Albus’ hazy post-sex smile too to top it off. It worked more than he cared to admit.

He lay there for a long time afterwards, panting with cooling come on his hand and stomach before he mustered the energy to get up and shower off, taking the precaution to shave in preparation for his meeting his Gellert the next day. He wasn’t quite sure whether it was warranted but it didn’t hurt to be prepared. He dressed in pyjamas and relished in the domesticity an evening of far too loud music blasting his eardrums through his headphones and menial chores about the flat that kept him busy but bored. He hadn’t been on a run since he’d found Peverell’s body and despite the appeal of letting off some more steam in a healthier way, Newt couldn’t bring himself to go near that park again. Not yet.

Newt fell asleep at some point after eleven and steamed through the rest of his lectures until his lunch with Gellert a bit addled but excited and jumpy all the same. It was an odd feeling, not quite jittery but not _not_ either. He was bouncing from one foot to the other the whole way over. Newt arrived a little late because he stopped off at a small shop that he’d looked up on the way but was no more than a few minutes and he was quick to knock in an attempt to compensate. Gellert opened the door, nodding politely and whilst it set off a twinge down Newt’s spine that he was being oddly formal again, he still couldn’t trump the anticipation as Gellert led him through to the kitchen after shedding his bag, jumper and coat in the hallway cupboard. All three taken in another oddly more-formal-than-recently gesture. Newt couldn’t help but feel that it was incredibly telling that given time, Gellert was feeling less than happy with what Newt had confessed to him but it stung more than he cared to admit that the older man was reacting in such a delayed way. The fact that he still didn’t seem angry, just…distant. It hurt.

Gellert was busy setting out frankly beautiful plates of salad and couscous when Newt finally fumbled the plastic bag he’d brought and retrieved the item within. “I thought I’d bring something this time,” Newt said, holding out the bottle a bit apprehensively with one fidgety hand and Gellert cocked an eyebrow as he took it, reading the label with evident dubiousness and surprise.

“Dalmore 18-year? Fruity and spicy with notes of vanilla, orange zest and a touch of almond. An interesting blend and one that I must say I would not have expected coming as a gift from you.”

Newt shrugged, not offended by the incredulity therein as it certainly wasn’t the sort of thing that he would have usually either bought or tasted himself; there was just something about the image emblazoned on the bottlethat appealed to him and reminded him of Gellert in a way that he couldn’t quite place. “Well, as it was your money that paid for it, I’m not entirely sure if it counts as much of a gift. Perhaps more just something to take the edge off,” he ducked his head, “And an olive branch of sorts too, I suppose.”

Gellert’s demeanour softened then, the crinkles around his eyes reappearing as he set the bottle on the kitchen counter and caught Newt’s elbow with one hand, the other tipping Newt’s face about to look at him even if that touch didn’t linger. “You need not offer branches of any kind, Newt. I told you that I do not wish to hold this…discrepancy against you.”

“But what if I wanted you to?” Newt asked, gaze fierce and astute on the mismatched one before him. “I don’t want this to be let go just like that. I did something wrong and you acting like it doesn’t bother you doesn’t make me feel any better. It makes me feel as if you think so little of me that this isn’t a surprise to you,” his heart clenched tight in his chest at the admission before he added quietly, “I would rather you did…did _something_ rather than pretending.” is heart clenched tight in his chest at the admission before he added quietly, “I would rather you did…did _something_ rather than pretending.”

“You want me to punish you?” Gellert’s voice was so soft that it sent a shiver up the zoologist’s spine and the older mam’s eyes were hard enough that Newt knew he meant every word. It was not a tease. It was an offer. A promise. An olive branch...of sorts. 

He nodded silently.

“Then I believe I may have some inspiration of where we should start.”

*******

Newt ended up hovering in the centre of Gellert’s office, the room that had so entranced him the first time he’d entered it and this time was no different. Even if this time around his wrists were bound with soft red cord-rope – in front of him to accommodate for his mending injuries - and he was dressed only in his blue boxers. Gellert stood before him, in shirt-sleeves, well-fitted trousers and a patterned black-gold brocade waistcoat hugging his chest to a flattering degree. He held a glass of whiskey in one hand that he was readily sipping from and something bulged within the pocket of his tight trousers. It had been an efficient process, almost systematic in the way Gellert had him strip down after they finished eating the light lunch he’d prepared.

If there was something hard glimmering in Gellert’s mismatched eyes, Newt chalked it down to the fact that this was a punishment for a true wrong rather than a perceived infraction for the purposes of kinky fun. It was warranted. It was different from what Newt had experienced before, sure he’d played the cliché naughty-student, stern-teacher roleplay with Albus a few times but this was something else entirely.

The rope binding him was deceptively strong for the softness of the cords and as Newt reflexively tested it by tightening the muscles in his arm and rotating his wrists slightly, he found it really quite reassuring that it had no give. Scary, too, of course, but more grounding than anything. Like the belt had been before. He liked having a point to centre upon and this felt as good as any. Something to remind him where he was and what he was doing; that he wasn’t caught in the horrific bindings of his dreams and instead something much more controlled and regulated. Not the random, nightmarish chaos.

Gellert’s voice broke him from his reverie, “Now, Newt, I am only going to ask this once - are you sure that you’re ready for this?”

Newt tilted his head and eyed Gellert’s sharp jaw through the flip of his fringe, “Don’t you think that was rather something you should have asked before you tied me up?”

A small, permissive smile tugged at the corners of Gellert’s lips, “Perhaps, but if I had you wouldn’t have had much of an idea of what was on my mind in terms of your punishment.”

“I still don’t, really,” Newt muttered and Gellert arched one elegant eyebrow at him, clearly awaiting a proper response and Newt acquiesced with a head bob of contrition, “But yes, I’m sure.”

“Very well,” Gellert gestured for him to follow him and Newt did so with some trepidation, his legs feeling all fumbly and weird as his bare toes sank into the olive-green carpet, he faltered a little though when Gellert stopped beside his desk. It was clear of all notes, ornaments and the lamp that had previously decorated it and Newt noted the change with a dawning wariness, most especially when he noticed the solitary object left on the surface was an insulated metal container of ice cubes. He looked back to the doctor who was regarding him as impassively as ever, aloof and ever so slightly excited if the crinkle-eyes were a tell, which Newt was beginning to believe they were.

“So where exactly are we going with this?” Newt asked, voice forcibly relaxed even as the bruised muscles of his upper body remained tense enough to belay that. “Have you done this sort of thing, punishment, I mean, before?”

Gellert looked at him levelly over the desk, his fingertips pressed to the polished wooden surface and supporting him as he leant over it slightly, “Not as a punishment, no but I’m nothing if not innovative.” 

“I’m sure…” Newt murmured and though it was low, Gellert expression tightened slightly and Newt dipped his head in apology, when he looked back up, Gellert’s eyes were glinting in the light from the standing lamp, the curtains having been closed to preserve their privacy and a bit of Newt’s dignity.

He was struck at that moment that the doctor’s heterochromatic eyes reminded him a little of the 70s-era Bowie wall-print that his mother had had hanging in the den in their family home for years before one of the budgerigars they kept knocked it down and smashed the frame. Though Gellert’s eyes were certainly more striking, more drastically different and more eerie than glamourous though certainly beautiful too. Newt realised that his mind might be drifting but the distracting thought was enough to calm the uptick his heart-rate had taken and enough to draw him to stand directly before the desk as Gellert directed him to. His knees pressed to the cool grain of the wood and his hips met the edge as he instinctively pressed himself closer to it, perhaps a bit out a need to escape the invasive gaze of the man before him. It didn’t unsettle him exactly but there was still a decent part of Newt that was apprehensive about the punishment he was about to receive.

Gellert tutted, however, and moved around to the desk to stand behind Newt, large, warm hands gripping his hips and moving him that bit further away from the desk so that it no longer provided any cover. He was on full display now and pressed flush against the older man’s sturdy chest, Gellert’s hips fitting to the curve of his arse but not yet with any particular intent. It felt almost like a reminder and Newt suspected that it was a part of the lesson he was supposed to be learning. Unfortunately, it also caused a flash of memory to surge within him. Graves pressed tight against him as his fingers worked Newt up to and over the edge, fingers gripping and gliding wherever they pleased as they both panted their need in the relative privacy of the bathroom stall. He shook himself internally with scolding fervour, feeling guilt surge just as strongly as the arousal and sharply telling his raging libido that thinking about the man you had an affair with whilst your partner was pressed up against you was a terrible idea. Especially when said partner seemed to possess an uncanny ability to know just what was going on in his head at any given time. He was a psychiatrist for Christ’s sake. 

“Now, Newt, there’s no need for that,” Gellert was murmuring the words into his ear, lips close to scraping the shell of it and his nose brushing Newt’s hair. “There’s no need to hide yourself from me.”

“Not hiding,” Newt countered in a mumble, looking at Gellert’s hands on him through the cover of his fringe. “Just not entirely sure what I’m waiting for here and it's making me a touch nervous.”

“Understandable.”

Newt cocked his head, “What, no telling me not to be nervous? That I’m just being silly?”

Gellert’s right hand slid up Newt’s side, lightly caressing the skin there and fingertips tripping a bruise. “I told you that I would always be honest with you, did I not?” 

Newt shuddered but leant back into the feeling of Gellert’s lips on the side of his neck, “You did.”

“Well, I think we should get started, don’t you?”

Newt nodded, mute and unsure but trusting enough in the other man that the tightness in his chest was not overwhelming or enough to put him off imagining all the things that could happen.

“Turn around and then sit on the edge of the desk for me,” came the quiet instruction and Newt obeyed, hitching himself awkwardly up onto the lacquered surface, feeling it cool and supportive beneath his bare thighs and the backs of his knees. His sea-stained eyes instantly zeroed in on what Gellert held in his hand, evidently what he had withdrawn from his pocket as the material of his trousers now lay undisturbed. At first, the zoologist had trouble identifying exactly what the small silver instrument actually was but it suddenly clicked as he saw the distinct shape the metal bands formed.

“A-a-...a chastity device?” he heard his own voice stutter as he looked at the intricately meshed cock cage that rested in Gellert’s palm and the doctor arched an eyebrow at him almost in challenge.

“A fitting punishment, is it not?”

Newt could only stare, imagining what that would feel like on his cock and just how much torment he was expected to go through before Gellert felt he was satisfied. “How-…how long?”

“Well,” Gellert began, almost thoughtfully but Newt knew that this was something the man had already considered at great length and that he was simply pausing for dramatic effect. It was working, he could feel his anticipation growing along with his rabbiting heartrate. “I think that the duration of your reprimand should entirely depend upon how many times you’ve come in the time that we have been together that have not been by my hand.”

Newt gaped, “I-”

“How many times would you reckon that was, Newt? Be honest now or I might just consider abandoning the idea of retribution altogether.”

Newt thought about it – both in terms of his involvement with Graves and the times he’d masturbated to either the thoughts of Gellert or Graves - and winced as he answered honestly, “Maybe…maybe four times?”

“Four times,” Gellert repeated, seeming to accept the answer before nodding almost to himself and setting the cage on the table beside Newt with a decisive _clack._ “I think four days should do it, don’t you?”

Newt’s eyes bugged, “What?! Four-… _days_?”

Gellert regarded him mildly, “Yes, that should take us up until Friday and then – if you’ve earned it – the weekend shall be ours to relieve your discomfort as much as you like.” He smiled genially, “A reward for your forthrightness and obedience on the matter. It means a great deal to me that you didn’t try to lie to me about this, Newt.”

Newt swallowed, looking to the cage lying beside him with double the amount of apprehension but also a great deal of excitement at the promise, “I-...how would I-…go about my daily activities with _that_ on?”

“It was built with that in mind and merely discourages erections rather than restricting all bodily functions,” he tapped one long finger on the device sharply and Newt jumped a little on the table, the backs of his feet thumping loudly against the desk as he did so. “As for bathing, I think I could take time out of my schedule in the evenings to come and assist you there.” His eyes were piercing Newt’s now, testing and expectant and somehow, despite the presumptive nature of the whole thing, it was also proving an enticing idea. And if it helped assuage a little of the guilt…

“Alright,” his voice was so quiet even he barely heard it but Gellert clearly did as he nodded swiftly and reached over to pick up the chastity device once more, thumb rubbing over the vertical metal bands and the partially open end in a cursory manner that was clearly intended to draw Newt’s eye.

“Now, Newt, I’m going to need you to stay as still as you can for me and try your very best not to get hard because if you do, I will not relieve you and I’ll be forced to use less pleasant methods,” his eyes moved meaningfully over to the container of ice and Newt swallowed thickly, the thought both arousing and intimidating in equal amounts, especially when coupled with thoughts of the last time that Gellert had introduced him to the intricacies of ice playing across his bare skin.

Newt nodded jerkily in response to the warning and Gellert moved closer, hooking his thumbs into the elastic of Newt’s navy-blue boxers and sliding them down and away, not wasting any time as he approached with the device. He took Newt’s cock into his hand with deceptive clinicalness that Newt supposed stemmed from being a doctor and having had to deal with people’s bodies in a non-sexual way plenty before. However, Newt’s cock didn’t seem to have gotten the message as it tried to plump up the second that Gellert began to slide the cold metal over it, fighting against the restraint being placed upon it in a gallant effort that belied the zoologist’s best efforts.

Thankfully, Gellert managed to clasp the cage in place and lock it behind his balls before Newt managed to get further than the first stirrings of semi-hard. It felt strange, not too heavy - not as heavy as he thought it would be - but certainly a weight. The partially-open end meant that it felt less constricting than it could have been but the tight fit of the thing made him strongly suspect that this wasn’t just a run of the mill sex toy that Gellert had had lying around and as he shifted a little awkwardly on the table, feeling the weight of it shift between his thighs, he could help but look up at Gellert with raised eyebrows. “Did you…have this custom made?”

Gellert at least had the decency to look a little abashed, “Not custom-made per se, but I did order it with solely you in mind.”

Newt flushed at the thought and ducked his head, eyes automatically going to his bound cock and not quite being able to take in the sight of it trapped as it was. His voice was a throaty murmur, “Bloody hell…”

“Now that that’s taken care of, I think we should get on with your punishment, don’t you?”

Newt’s head jolted up, his face paling slightly, “You mean that wasn’t it?”

Surely four days in this thing was enough of a punishment already? But Gellert only laughed quietly and shook his head, “No, Newt, that was more of a precaution than anything else.” Hid head tilted as his lips curved in an almost reminiscent smile, something goading and slick as his fingers drifted over Newt’s hip to glide down the curve of his arse, “I decided against a great deal of other far less accommodating options. I could have gone with a fully enclosed one, one that had an electro-shock function or perhaps one that had an attachment to stopper up that greedy little hole of yours," one long finger traced along his rim and pressed in just enough to push the elder's point home. Gellert’s eyes were aflame now and it caused that squirming sensation within Newt to double and he winced as he felt his cock try to stir in earnest in its new confines only to be thwarted by the cool metal bars encasing it. 

He jerked a bit on the table as Gellert stepped closer, his lips coming forward to hover before Newt’s for a few tense seconds until he broke the tension by leaning into the kiss. It was an odd thing, cool and clean and calculated but with the way that Newt’s hands and cock remained trapped between them, leaving him unable to reciprocate or explore as Gellert’s hands did him, the zoologist soon found himself quite flustered indeed. When they withdrew, Newt was panting breathlessly, lowly and his eyes were a touch glazed.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It wasn’t long after the kiss that Newt’s eyes lost all focus and he slumped forward into Gellert’s arms. He caught him with a touch of surprise but ease all the same, lifting him up into his arms to carry him through the house and to the bathroom, carefully placing the insentient youth on the wicker chair beside the bathtub. Gellert watched as his lids began flickering sporadically, attempting to open but not quite managing so as his expression went slack and open. It seemed that the recent tweaking of his medication was causing more episodes and whilst it was not ideal nor what he had planned for the day, Gellert was not one to waste an opportunity.

“Newt?” he called softly, tapping the boy’s face with one hand as the other cradled the weight of his skull, peeling back his eyelids to check his dilation and feeling sure in himself once more as he assessed that whilst being mostly out of it, Newt was not in any danger. At least not in terms of his immediate health. The wonderful thing about this sort of situation was that Newt was responsive yet utterly pliable. Unfortunately, one downside was that it was almost impossible to gauge how long each session was going to last. So far, the episodes had varied between the span of barely under a minute to nearly six hours and it was only by quick thinking that Gellert had gotten away with as much as he had.

Finger-fucking the boy when he passed out in Gellert’s guest bedroom. Playing with Newt’s arse until he came all over himself, never once waking until long after Gellert had cleaned him up. One time, he had even managed to get half his length down Newt’s throat before one of the boy’s feline guardians had hissed and warned the zoologist in some instinctual way that managed to wake him where Gellert’s ministrations had not. That had put an end to the experimentations at the youth’s flat but Newt was a ready enough guest at Gellert’s house often enough that it proved no imposition to Gellert’s desires. 

The fact that Newt had now willingly given the most intimate part of his body up to Gellert in an attempt at recompense for his betrayal was a new layer of intricacy and deliciousness that Gellert looked forward to exploiting. Very much so. There was something irresistible about that need to please and the thought that he had control over every last facet of the young man and that it was being allowed to happen. 

The doctor ran a mid-depth bath and manoeuvred Newt into it, keeping his head supported on the edge of the tub as he retrieved a fresh bar of soap and a flannel. He took care to remove his own shirt, trousers and waistcoat, neatly folding and setting them aside, leaving him only in his underwear. Gellert smiled to himself as he saw the smooth skin around the young man’s crotch and armpits, noting the ever-so-slightly reddened skin of the recently shaved. The pubic hair not entirely erased but trimmed to a clearly cared for degree. Newt must’ve been feeling optimistic despite Gellert’s attitude towards him on the call the day before.

He made sure to clean the boy thoroughly, inside and out, not taking the time he might’ve liked in the uncertain window he had but still enjoyed gliding the soft cotton cloth over the boy’s smooth skin and replacing the awfully artificial scent of shower-gel on him with clean, plain soap that boasted a hint of vanilla to take the clinical edge off. Gellert smiled as he thought of how the bouquet of the whiskey Newt had bought would have suited his own flavour quite well should Gellert decide to take a taste of him right now. His runner's legs particularly appealed as whilst slender, they had a decent leanness to them that could prove ideal for thinly sliced cuts of well-seasoned, pan-fried meat. He imagined that none of Newt’s omnivorous creatures would turn their noses up at such cuts, most especially not the fox. But he sighed a little in regret as he contented himself to waiting for that particular feast and merely enjoying the one presented for him now as it came. 

Gellert had managed to work two fingers into Newt, steadily fucking them into a teasing rhythm on the boy’s prostate, the youth’s head rolling loose on his neck against the wall and the edge of the tub, little panting gasps escaping those perfect pout-prone pink lips when Newt’s eyelids began to flicker open in earnest. Gellert paused in his ministrations and withdrew his fingers, using his other hand to reach up and stroke the side of Newt’s face, doing so with enough force for the youth to feel it even in his hazy state. This time, the reaction resulted in a slight grimace and Newt’s head lolled forward, his brows furrowing, his lips pressed together, tongue darting out to wet them as he came around gradually. Gellert checked his watch, thirty-seven minutes exactly. A mid-range elapse then.

“Wha-…what happened?” Newt garbled, voice low and rough.

“What do you mean?” Gellert asked, feigning innocence with practised ease.

“We-…we were in your office…?”

The boy sounded so delightfully unsure of himself and Gellert made sure to frown worriedly up at the younger man, one hand resting on his thigh as the other gently caressed his cheekbone.

“You lost time again?” he dipped his head in a perfect parody of regret and self-condemnation as he went to withdraw his touch, “Damnit, I hadn’t realised or else I would not have-”

Newt, the sweet boy that he was, was quick to console him, leaning forward in the water towards Gellert, not seeming to feel it sloshing over his skin as he did so and Gellert repressed a smile at the instinctual behaviour – the trust involved therein, “It’s alright…I know it’s not your fault. I haven’t had one in a while so I can hardly blame you for thinking-” his breath hitched, eyes blinking rapidly, pupils blown wide and uncertain, fear edging his scent like the finest of perfumes, “This is getting rather out of hand…this shouldn’t keep happening, should it?”

“It is not unusual for more…strenuous activities to cause reoccurrences of issues such as these,” Gellert informed him; it was true enough but it wasn’t as if Newt was aware that there was a more pharmaceutical excuse for the phenomenon. “But as these episodes do not seem to be leaving you any worse for wear, I believe that for now, I can only promise to keep a better eye out in future.” 

“God, I’m sorry you have to deal with this, you probably get more than enough of this sort of thing at work without having to deal with it now,” Newt seemed at least a little out of it still as he hadn’t seemed to quite clock onto the fact that he was naked, in a bath and still bound until he looked down at himself and flushed a brilliant and fetching cerise, his legs shifting with a slap of water as he evidently noticed the loosened feeling of his hole. His lips slowly spread in a shy smile as he looked through his lashes at Gellert, “I don’t suppose you could catch me up with where this was going, could you? Because this seems like a promising start…” 

“You _did_ seem to be enjoying yourself…” Gellert began with a smile of his own, his hand sliding up Newt’s thigh to caress the metal encasing the youth’s cock who shuddered underneath his touch, stuttering a breath. “But I do not believe that my memory is impaired when I recall that this was supposed to be a punishment.” His forefinger brushed over the head of Newt’s cock and it twitched in a pitiful attempt to harden again and Gellert’s smile widened at the evident frustration on the zoologist’s face, his thighs rubbing together slightly as he squirmed in the water, trying to get some friction and relieve his need.

“Any particular reason we took this to the bathroom?” Newt queried hesitantly and Gellert ducked his head with a faux-apologetic smile in response.

“I’ve told you before I’m a bit of a stickler for hygiene so when you suggested we take a bath together, I wasn’t about to argue.” 

“Well, you seem awfully high and dry up there, Dr Grindelwald,” Newt prodded and Gellert skimmed his hand down Newt’s shin, loosely gripping his ankle for a moment before pushing the zoologist upward abruptly so that he could climb atop the younger man in the water. Newt let out a small noise of surprise, not unlike a startled animal and it triggered something in Gellert that had him quickly pinning Newt to the porcelain edge of the tub tighter than he perhaps should have given the boy’s injuries. He kissed him fiercely, bearing down on the young zoologist with clear intent and Newt had no choice but to take it, the sweet scent of his skin mingling with arousal and fear and a potent concoction of other things that proved to entice Gellert further. He was scared but he was _loving it_ all the same.

He could feel Newt’s arms moving between them, whether trying to get him to ease off or to return the touch in kind, Gellert could not be sure but erring on the side of caution, he let the movement happen, easing off a bit. Newt’s face was flushed, chest heaving and eyes half-lidded, the younger man evidently struggling to keep above the water of his own volition. As much as watching him struggle was always a pleasure, having Newt drown in the tub beneath him was perhaps not an ideal end to this particular endeavour.

Gellert got up out of the bath, helping Newt and wrapping a soft cotton towel around his bruised shoulders, rubbing it over him and then himself in quick succession. “As much as I enjoy the comforts of warm water, I don’t think that this is a proper setting for what I have planned.”

Newt nodded, following the grip Gellert took on his bound wrists and flushing prettily behind his freckles as he was led through the house to the master bedroom and Gellert was not gentle as he pushed the younger man onto the bed. He didn’t need to be as careful now, not on the softer surface and he took full advantage of that by rolling Newt onto his stomach, pulling the zoologist’s arms upwards and tethering the rope in place at the headboard. The doctor’s lips mapped the bruises littering the young man’s skin, teeth grazing each knobble of his spine and the jut of his shoulder blades, tongue gliding over each tiny indent of teeth he left, soothing the reddened skin even as he did not let up on the explorations.

There was another container of ice left beside the bed and Gellert barely hesitated as he scooped out two fresh cubes, gliding them over Newt’s bruised spine and smiling at the gasps and hisses that drew from his lips. He bucked and exclaimed “Ah! Gellert-…that’s-…hnng…c-cold!”

“Ice usually is,” Gellert responded with a smirk, taking another few cubes and scattering them across the zoologist’s back with a cavalier shake of one hand, as if he were throwing dice, resulting in even more of those lovely sounds. “It should help with the pain, I would imagine. Numb it a little.”

“Not s-sure if ‘help’ would b-be the right word…” Newt stuttered out, yelping and arching when one of the cubes slid down the dip of his lower back and skimmed down the perfect, pale globes of his ass to disappear off into the bedsheets. Intrigued, Gellert retrieved the ice cube before it melted into the sheets any further and trailed it down Newt’s crack before pressing it inside the boy with a curious smile. His rim struggled to take it, Newt’s muscles flexed instinctively, trying to push out the unwelcome sensation of freezing cold dampness but only succeeded in sucking the cube inside instead. Gellert’s smirk widened as he retrieved more ice and used one pale thumb to push another three inside after the first, one by one and relishing in the feel of cool, tight muscles flexing around the digit, accepting him even as they instinctively tried to reject the intrusion.

And despite the whimpers leaving Newt’s trembling lips, the scent of arousal had never been stronger. 

Newt was moving still, his arms reflexively tugging at his restraints and legs squirming as his length lay barely-hard between his legs, making a valiant effort to escape its cage but failing even as the pleasure coursed through the boy’s body. The scent and feel of frustration in the room and against his own body was enough that Gellert could delay no longer and he stripped his wet boxers off, casting them aside and fisting his own aching length, guiding it in between the boy’s thighs and kissing that tight, puckered little hole with the tip, kissing it just so that Newt would know what was coming.

Newt went still beneath him, his legs stopped their innate kicking and arms twisted about to grip the rope as if for a support or to hold on for dear-life, Gellert noted this for barely a second before he speared the boy. It took one solid, no doubt uncomfortable thrust that had Newt gasping, the sweaty, flushed side of his face pressed into the pillow, inhaling nothing but the scent of Gellert and moaning low in his throat as Gellert’s hands gripped his hips, pulling him up to meet each thrust. He did not ease into it, sensing the desperation in Newt and not having to pace himself around the youth’s release as it wasn’t going to happen. Not properly and not tonight; not for at least another four days. The thought of Newt squirming and struggling and desperate for release for days on end, going about his daily business and constantly aware of his throbbing, trapped cock, the ache in his gut that he wouldn’t be able to satisfy without Gellert’s permission…it had Gellert hammering into the youth with what felt like divine purpose for all the glory he revelled in from it. 

Newt’s mouth had been sweet enough, experienced and hot and wet like nothing else, the perfect lips forming delicious suction around him, but _this_ was another thing entirely, the tight, cool, almost crushing feel of the boy’s insides clenching around his cock, milking him and trapping him even as much as it felt as though it were resisting his entrance…it was _glorious_. The melted ice within him only added another layer of pleasure to the experience, singing his senses and no doubt Newt’s even more so.

“Ge-” Newt gasped, swallowed and gasped again, hips jolting back into the older man and his wide eyes beseeching over his own shoulder, clearly desperate. “Gellert…please…”

But the doctor only smiled. “Remember, Newt, this is a punishment,” he reminded him calmly even as he continued to thrust ever-faster, his own mismatched eyes intent upon the younger man’s, driving in the message as he growled, “You _asked_ to pay penance and that’s exactly what…You. Shall. Get!”

Each of the last three words was punctuated by a decisive thrust and on the final one, Gellert’s eyes fluttered closed as he came, letting out a deep moan as he spilt his release into his lovely little Newt, his lower-half collapsing on top of the youth without pulling out, pinning the zoologist’s legs and grinding into his arse with one final, jerky movement.

“Such a good boy…” the words disintegrated from his lips and Newt’s eyes flickered slightly as he looked upon him, the boy’s chin tucked against his own shoulder for a moment before he kissed Gellert when the doctor’s face dropped low enough for him to reach. It wasn’t as desperate as it could have been, more accepting and sweet and something else that even someone of Gellert’s acumen could not name.

“Gellert…” his name was a sigh on his fiery boy’s lips and Gellert made sure to release the youth’s arms before permanent damage was done, drawing him down where he curled readily against Gellert’s chest, sweat-slick skin touching and Gellert’s softening cock remaining inside the younger man. Gellert was usually a fastidious individual when it came to cleaning up and aftercare, to not remain in such a purely sentimental, impractical manner, but there was something that had him lingering. Relishing in the way the boy’s messy curls brushed his chin as Gellert leaned forward, cradling the youth to his chest and keeping him locked close in a tight embrace and Newt seemed perfectly content to remain there despite the discomfort his trapped cock must be causing him.

Newt nuzzled into the encasement of Gellert’s arms over his chest and around the base of his neck, eyes slipping closed and breathing slowing to a deeper, steadier rhythm, not asleep but content in his place in Gellert’s embrace. Probably more content than he would have been in actual slumber. The truth of an unrealised nightmare was probably an easier burden for the boy to bear than those that he was submerged in each night.

But unfortunately for both of them, lies could not last forever. For now, though, the ice could serve as an adequate balm for what was to come, even if Newt did not yet realise it.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It was nearly evening when they moved again, around 5pm according to the clock on the bedside-table and Newt was fairly sure he’d drifted off again at some point, curled protectively in Gellert’s arms. It was nice, simply laying there, even if his arousal had not been abated, he found the gentle way Gellert held him, smoothed his hair back from his face and kissed various spots of bare skin within reach helped to lull him despite the discomfort. He was roused from the semi-stupor – a thankfully natural one this time around – by the rumbling of his stomach and he heard a low chuckle hum through Gellert’s chest behind him and couldn’t help a nervous, embarrassed chuckle of his own.

“Hungry?” Gellert asked, voice low and satisfied and Newt nodded, stretching a little cat-like in the elder’s arms and the doctor released him a moment later, Newt hissing lowly as Gellert finally slipped free from his rather sore arse.

“Might fancy a shower first if that’s alright?”

“Of course,” Gellert said, rolling off the edge of the bed and heading towards the door himself, shamelessly naked and Newt curled onto his side, enjoying the view until Gellert caught him looking and the elder smirked. Newt propped his good arm up between his head and the headboard, adjusting himself to a more comfortable angle, rolling onto his back above the covers and deliberately not averting his gaze. Gellert’s eyes roved over him and he paused, shirt in hand as he stood by the wardrobe, eyes seeming to take in every freckle, bruise, scrape and aspect of his body with apparent satisfaction. It was nearly a minute before Newt felt compelled to break the silence with a quiet huff of laughter. 

“You’re staring.”

“I’m gazing,” Gellert corrected with an arched eyebrow and Newt snorted.

“I could accuse you of being creepy, you know.”

“I like to think of it being more romantic but if it really bothers you so much, I shall take my ‘creepy stare’ downstairs to make dinner.”

Newt smiled, letting his own eyes drift closed, rolling over slightly onto his side.

“I’m sure you know where the bathroom is,” Newt nodded, eyes opening again as he heard the sounds of crinkling, shifting fabric as he slipped on casualwear that still managed to make Newt’s finest clothes look like charity-shop fodder…granted, a fair deal of it actually was but Newt had no problem with that usually. “I’ll be in the kitchen when you’re finished, there are clean clothes in the guest room if you want them.”

“Thank you,” Newt murmured, face half-buried in the pillow, feeling like he was nesting more than was perhaps healthy in another man’s bed. Gellert didn’t seem to mind though as he chuckled again and left.

A little later, Newt managed to drag himself out of bed and into the bathroom down the hall, showering for a luxurious amount of time under the hot spray that helped relax his muscles and then did as Gellert suggested by borrowing some fresh clothes. It was once again – as with the cock-cage that hang heavy between his legs – suspiciously well-fitting and Newt picked out some charcoal grey jeans and an item that didn’t seem to fit in Gellert’s wardrobe at all in the form of a navy blue knit jumper that had a large red-gold bird emblazoned across the chest in soft, supple wool. Gellert’s house was surprisingly warm considering its age and size but it was still late autumn so no matter the high quality of the building maintenance, Newt found himself snuggling a little into both the warmth and scent of the jumper.

He padded barefoot downstairs and to the kitchen with damp, soft curls flopping annoyingly into his face and a hazy, guilty, slightly giddy smile gracing his lips. Gellert greeted him without a word but with a smile and two plates of huevos high life – with vegetarian sausage for Newt – and they sat in his immaculate dining room in companionable silence for quite some time before Gellert placed down his forkful of brioche and egg and spoke.

“You told me that one of the reasons you went to Graves as you did was that you believed I was holding back on you,” he paused before looking directly at Newt with a twinkling gaze that reminded Newt an astounding amount of Albus in that moment despite the associations of dishonesty involved later therein. “I had thought that I had already implied that you could speak your mind all you liked, but it seems I was mistaken,” Gellert’s smile was bordering playful and suddenly undeniably open, “You’re free to ask me anything that’s on your mind.”

Newt hesitated, unsure entirely what to ask when a world of possibilities was presented to him before he decided upon, “Your relationship - the one that made you not-… that made it difficult for you to trust people, can you tell me more about it?”

Gellert paused too, looking like he hadn’t quite expected that particular question but he answered oddly readily, nonetheless, “What exactly do you want to know?”

“What happened between you two? Why did it end?”

“It ended because of a difference of opinion,” Gellert responded and Newt frowned questioningly.

“And what difference was that, exactly?”

Gellert looked almost annoyed and it surprised Newt more than he had ever expected to be, “We were together from a young age and shared a great deal of views and ideologies as young men do, but we drifted apart after a time. He changed and I did not. He decided that we no longer…worked together, and despite my opinions on the matter, he wished to be apart. I respected his wishes because pretending would not have benefitted either of us. We each followed our own paths and I have not seen him in quite some time. Years.” 

Newt nodded slowly, chewing through both the information and his meal for a while longer before he asked, “And has there been anyone else since...?”

“Nothing comparable, no,” came the quiet, sombre reply and there was a sadness in Gellert’s gaze that Newt hasn’t seen before, a crack in the well-put-together exterior and Newt found himself reaching over to gently touch the elder's wrist, resting his hand as a silent bolster.

Gellert’s eyes met his and he offered him a small smile, “I can imagine that it must sound awfully hypocritical for me to advise others to move on from their pasts when I lament a love scorned and lost decades prior.”

Newt shook his head, “Not at all, some things stay with you – shape you, no matter what you do and there’s nothing wrong with that to an extent,” his head tilted as his eyes found the table once more out of habit and sentiment. “I think you’ve just got to learn where that limit is and realise when it’s time to do your best to move on.”

Newt could feel Gellert’s eyes on him as the doctor replied, “I believe you may well be right.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, just as a note, the Dalmore 18-year's bottle is worth a look at if you're interested. Little easter-egg lol.   
> Also FYI, I'm going to start tagging chapters' contents properly so readers can be aware of the specifics warnings in each. Hope it helps :)


End file.
